Sunrise
by Ketch117
Summary: And with the dawn, morning came and the dream was shattered, undone by the light of day.
1. Chapter 1

**Stephanie Meyer provided the Target, Kouta Hirano, Jim Butcher, Joss Whedon, Bram Stoker, Mike Mignola, Marv Wolfman, Robert E Howard, ****Type-Moon, Simon R. Green,**** Niel Gaiman and no shortage of other people created the Means and I created the End. But this does not entitle me to 33%.**

**Tolkien was not involved in any way, shape or form. You should totally read his books anyway.**

**This is not simple Twilight bashing. I could never write that, it would be wasting everyone's time. What I am doing is extending the philosophies and concepts in all of these works to see how they work in concert, while expressing a certain interest in writing interactions between certain characterizations and archetypes. Yes, Twilight characters die, but this is not hate. This is a kind of hard love. Enjoy it.**

**This takes place around the end of the second Twilight Book, set in 1998. Or something like that. You don't have to be familiar with all those people to read this, but it helps. **

**Chapter One**

**Chicago**

I was up in my office, a small room in a rundown five blocks up and smaller then my bedroom, desperately trying to put some order in the piles of bills, pamphlets and those damned catalogs the electronic stores persisted in sending me. Being a Warden means I won't starve anytime soon, but that's about it. I live cheaper than the tightest Scotsman.

Mouse, looking as he usually does—a small gray hill covered in fur- suddenly sat up and let out a confused bark. Someone he didn't recognize and had yet to form an opinion on was coming. I put the forms aside with more than a little relief, and straightened a few things on my desk, achieving nothing. It's still an untidy sprawl. I can't even say I know where everything is, and regularly find myself desperately digging through piles looking for something or another. Making another soon to be forgotten mental note to get ordered at some point, I straighten my clothes and generally try to make myself somewhat presentable.

The doorbell made a choking sound and went dead despite someone audibly pushing the button. Whoever was on the other side didn't seem to care; they simply stopped pressing the button and began a heavy bashing that went on for six knocks. A small trickle of dust trickled down from the ceiling. Sighing, I opened the door to reveal an old man.

His features were craggy; he had a sharp nose and one deep-set eyes under a heavy brows, a glass eye brooding in one socket. His equally heavy jaw was covered in a thick grey beard like twisted wire, slightly untidy and cut short. He positively oozed charisma and raw confidence, put him in a crowd and you'd notice his face first. Every time.

He wasn't particularly big, but he did take up a lot of space. He was wearing a patternless light charcoal suit, with a darker tie, almost black, and a silver tie-pin in the shape of tree. It was well cared for, but more than slightly ruffled. He had slept in it, or worn it for several days consecutively.

I'm no stranger to that look myself. But there was something more...

Usually I can read people, even without looking into their souls. It's a talent that comes in handy in both my lines of work. Besides, people who want to employ me are usually pretty obvious. They're either nervous or a tad embarrassed, they think it's all a big joke but are curious despite themselves, or more superstitious then they should be. Or they're desperate. You get more then a few desperates who don't have anywhere else to go. Some of them are cautious, and most of them won't meet my eyes.

As first impressions go, this one was far from informative. Big, important looking, and a hell of a poker face.

So I start with my all-purpose introduction. "Harry Dresden, Wizard." I begin.

"I know who you are." He replied gruffly, shouldering past me, hanging his coat on the corner of a shelf and taking a seat. He sits down on the one chair in the room. The one I was sitting on a moment ago. The one behind my desk. My chair. Now, I'm not particularly possessive about my things. Doesn't pay to be, given that the wear on them from my lifestyle insures that anything I do work up a sentimental attachment too is kindling within a year. But there are certain protocols and unspoken rules that form the basis of interaction and communication, as well as basic politeness.

He just ignored pretty much all of them. He's clearly a total bastard. Still, if he wants to play it that way...

"Then you want something?" I say curtly.

"Of course."

"And are you going to keep being cagey? Because if you are, this is going on your bill."

"Right." He was really starting to annoy me, but showing the sort of restraint that has been hammered into me by years of training and self-control, I kept quiet. But it was starting to be a close thing. Very close.

"Got anything to drink? Anything with alcohol, I mean."

That was it. The straw that broke the camel's back. "Clearly you don't know me as well as you think. The sign on the door says 'Wizard'. Not 'Cafe', or 'pub'. I solve problems of a supernatural nature. I do not serve drinks."

"Well, if wizard you are, I have a job for you."

"Which would be?"

"You're in the business of investigation, Dresden. Well, what do you do when you have to cross the line to save a life?"

"I don't. Some lines shouldn't be crossed. Sometime I have to kill, but I never enjoy it, and only when I have no other options. I'm not prepared to go out looking for a fight. I'm not a murderer."

"A narrow distinction."

"I'm not going to kill someone for you. Every day, I wake up, walk into my bathroom, take out my razor, and shave. And when I do, I can look at the man in the reflection, and smile. A few disappointments, but nothing to make me contemplate using the razor on myself. And that pleasure is worth more then any money you can pay me. I'm not selling my conscience."

"I'm not asking you to. What I'm asking is, you go to the town of Fawkes, and 'investigate'. Shake the tree until something falls out. And when you do find a nest of the strangest vampires you will ever meet, you act as you see fit, and remember there is a war going on. And since becoming a warden, you're a soldier."

Wait a second. How the hell does he know about that? No customer saunters in, just happening to know all that. I blink, and look at him again. He doesn't look like one of the fey, and besides, they tend not to be so subtle. He's definitely not a vampire himself, but he clearly knows quite a bit the supernatural. And more than that, he's calm about it. I feel like a contractor being asked to develop a property. Not what I'm used to at all.

"I also do children's parties. Now who are you?" I ask, trying to figure that out for myself. Now that I think about it, he looks a bit like a stereotypical wizard, or at least the public's idea of a stereotypical wizard, what with the beard, but he doesn't act like a second-rater. But if he does have power of his own, what's he need me for? I'm good, hell, I'm the best most people can reasonably expect to meet, but if you need supernatural firepower there are plenty of easier channels to go through. For a generally better standard of service, too.

"Call me...Wednesday." He replies, as though that's an answer. I don't think I've ever heard such an obvious pseudonym, and I can count the number of customers who are frank with me on one hand. And yet it does ring the faintest of bells. Then the entire cathedrals.

I'd blame all the sleepless nights I've been getting, except I've actually been getting plenty of rest so that won't cut it. Maybe I'm just getting lazy. I mean, it's something I should have seen through far faster. No, it's something I should have seen through straight away. But then, you don't expect this sort of person to just step into your office and ask you to do a job. You expect him to send a flunky, or leave you one of those brown packages with a list of cryptic instructions and more money then I see in a year. Or appear with a blast of frosty air, the Aurora Borealis shining in the background, and try to use their obvious power to coerce me. Mab, for example, is extremely fond of variations of that one. So I wasn't thinking in the direction I should have.

Before I have time to give it any more thought, he reaches a grizzled paw into the sleek lining of his suit and removes a fat wallet from his inside pocket. Big fingers open it and remove a stack of neat, crisp bills. That's a lot of Benjamin Franklins. He takes the merest fraction out, and straightens them. "I'm the man about the give you two thousand in cash. Plus expenses. That should tell you all you need to know about me."

"If you think I'm so easily bribed..."

"Bribery? This is me hiring a professional to perform a specific role. I'm not trying to buy you, or your conscience, Mr. Dresden. My reasons for bringing you into the picture are my own. If you don't trust me, I can't stop you from investigating me in your own time if you are that curious. You won't find anything of course." He gets to his feet, and leaves the money right there. Which makes it mine. "But I don't trust you with my name, anymore then I trust you with anything of mine. And that's my decision to make. Don't try to get into contact with me, I'll show up when I need it done and give you whatever else you need." He replaces the bowler hat I don't remember seeing him take off, and the coat.

"You are going to Forks. Washington. The people you want to investigate call themselves Cullens." He says, then leaves unobtrusively. That was already my favorite bit of his visit.

Usually I'm pretty straightforward. It's one of my better qualities, though plenty would tell you different. I take a job, or not, no skin off my nose. But I had to think long and hard about this. I didn't like my employer, and one of the wonderful things about being self-employed is if that's the case, there is nothing to stop me sticking up my middle finger and not do the work. That said, eating is nice to, and work's been slow. And while I didn't like him, he offered me a legitimate job that doesn't mean compromising my integrity. Unlike Marcone. Criminal scumbag. And I do like having money to spend.

He didn't say when to begin the job, but it's not like I have anything better to do. Besides, I'll be doing this one alone. My apprentice is away, Michael taking the entire tribe to Europe for their Summer Break, Thomas was... a complicated issue, but I don't hate him enough to involve him in this sort of thing. And while I was the official regional Warden commander for North America, Ramirez and the other North American Wardens were helping the Fellowship in Brazil, and Murphy had enough on her plate, with two serial killers on the loose (ordinary serial killers. You don't need to be supernatural to be a psychopath, but it helps). That left me, with no backup to speak of, possibly taking on an entire vampire clan. And the worse part is I'm not even surprised anymore. When you live my life, these things are to be expected. And yet I never plan for them.

And besides. working for Odin would definitely be interesting.


	2. Chapter 2

**Somewhere, in Nevada**

He was one hundred and twenty miles south of the state line, and it was pissing down, the sort of rain where you wonder if the windscreen wipers are doing any good, like a river's been redirected to hit the front of the car. It doesn't rain much in the dessert, but when it does, it tries its hardest to make up for lost time, fat impacts hammering down as though the sea is trying to retake the land by airdrop.

Ghostly headlights glowing, a massive ten-wheeler Peterbilt speeds along the highway, engine roaring beneath. The trucks pushing ninety in a sixty zone, and given conditions even sixty would be pushing it on a stretch of road like this, but the driver doesn't give a damn, because he's either gotta be somewhere yesterday or because he's just reckless.

One look at the man behind the wheel and the question is answered, Jacks big, fit, has no idea the mullets gone out of fashion - or nobody's dared tell him, and he's got a good weeks stubble going with no sign of shaving in sight. He's wearing sunglasses even though it had been an overcast day and the sun set hours ago, drinking coffee out of a disposable cup, and talking into his radio with his other hand, as though letting the truck drive itself.

"You don't need sleep. Hell, sleep's something we're forced into when we're kids by the people that think they run the world, parents, teachers, you know, the type that likes to keep everything organized and tight in its place. Hell, the eight hours we say is a third of the day gone like that." He tries to snap his fingers, realizes he doesn't have a spare hand and resumes talking. "If you live to be fifty something like seventeen years you'll be spending on the shuteye. Seventeen years gone like that. You ask me, no one's got the time to waste. I got more important things to do myself."

He pauses, takes a huge gulp of coffee then resumes his tirade. "But then, the world's full of that. Systems, guidelines, things to fill up peoples time, 'till we don't know what to do with ourselves. What's it all for? You ask me, you ask old Jack, you don't get sucked in from the start. Pay your taxes and follow the laws, and keep the hell under the radar, that's the way I tell it."

A bend in the road looms ahead, but Jack Burton, with far more skill behind the wheel then you'd give him credit for looking at him, swerves around smoothly without spilling a drop of coffee or dropping the speed a hair, and accelerates on the way out, pushing past the hundred mark.

"Well I'm not the first to notice the state of the world, and I don't pretend to know any more then the next bastard lined up on talk-back radio, but it's clear that nobody has got the first clue what to do, so rather than whine just keep quiet and suck it in. Can't stand the fire, get your ass outta the kitchen. Like I always say, I don't pay my dues, I just charge 'em."

It's three hours until midnight, not a streetlight in sight and a long road ahead, which he's got all to himself. He's got a half full tank of gas, a truck full of delicate perishables due to the Fawkes branch of S-Mart, a small town all the way in Washington, and no sign of stopping yet. Putting the radio down he reaches up above the dashboard and removes a huge sandwich, taking a bite of grilled bacon, cheese and sauce, then puts it back unconcernedly, glancing in the rear vision mirror briefly then turning his gaze back on the road, reaching for his sandwich again.

Eating up the miles with a steady rumble, he switches on the FM. AC/DC is playing 'Highway to Hell'. He smiles, nodding his head in time to the music and takes another bite of his sandwich.

A few miles down the road, a distance that is rapidly disappearing, a man slouches through the rain, waiting for his next lift.

Most people would not have been able to successfully hitch-hike all the way from San Francisco to this far in Nevada. But then, nobody else was John Constantine, and when you can catch the synchronicity express whenever you need to, there was always someone willing to stop and give you a lift, even if they didn't know it until that instant.

And most people weren't as driven as Constantine was at this moment. There were very few things he treasured, and one that had almost cost him his soul had been taken. And now, he wanted it back. Soon, or he'd be in trouble. The sort of trouble that involves cement shoes and the bottom of a river. Or in his case, beheaded.

He's fairly sure that Hell won't risk him dying. Nowhere near enough to stick around and test the thesis. Besides, something has been stolen. Something that cost him his soul. Or a third of it. No way would he just give it up. And it would set a bad precedent. Let one thief take your things and the next thing you know everyone is doing it. Matter of principle.

So he made his way, following the magical trail that had been left for him to find. He was being lured into a trap, or else the thief was far too stupid to have been able to steal from him. Of course, he was just as stupid if he thought it was a good idea to lure John Constantine into a trap, so he wasn't passing judgment yet.

The last one who to stop and offer him a lift had turned out to be a serial killer. And now, he was digesting in the stomach of something that it was best not to think about lest it notice. John hadn't had to get lethal to sort him out, but he'd really wanted to, and that was enough for him. He had been in a bad mood; still was. Besides, the man had pissed him off. John had dodged the knife, called in a few recent debts owed. The atmosphere inside the vehicle was perfect for it: well-scrubbed but never removed old blood had soaked between the seat cushions and was crying out for vengeance enough to give any medium a headache. The killer hadn't even had a chance to scream.

And the murderer's car had got him this far, before the engine had spluttered and died, leaving him alone on a barren stretch of road, with the rain pouring down like it had something to prove, and nobody to be seen for miles.

Constantine had sighed, ditched the car, and begun walking, counting down from one thousand under his breath, his hands in the pockets of his trenchcoat, riffling around for his Silk Cut cigarettes. After what seemed an eternity, he located them beneath a few loose pages and stuck one between his lip. Sparks flew, but his lighter had run out a few miles back. He sighed, and offered the laws of nature a little less natural assistance, but even that didn't work. Which meant the storm was supernatural, in all probability. It had spluttered and died before he could so much as take a drag. Already irritable, he was now increasingly annoyed, the rain streaming all over him, soaking him through. By now his clothes were sticking to him, his hair was plastered down, and he was shivering. The fact that his coat was waterproof made things worse; it was keeping the wet in.

He got to fifty. In the distance, he could hear the rumble of an engine, a vibration on the air. With a few, short strides, he stepped onto the middle of the road, and waited. At thirty he could see the headlights, at fourteen it appeared behind him, at eleven the driver was braking, at three it came to a stop, behind him.

The wonderful thing about American currency is until you get it close, nobody can tell the difference between a fifty and a fiver. Particularly in the pouring rain. Truck drivers were, John had learned by this point after two days mooching lifts, not supposed to give random, disreputable-looking strangers lifts. Particularly if they look like him. Matters of insurance, they called it.

This one stopped, and opened the door, as he had known he would, but no need to get smug about it. Of course, John thought as he got a look at Burton, this guy's not in much better shape than me, so why question it.

Messy blond hair, an old coat, and a face that you can't help but distrust, John looked more like a Sting wannabe then a master of the occult. But then, he liked punk, even played for a while, though it would be a bit of a stretch to call what his no-name failure of a band produced music. Why should he let his job define him when music was at least as interesting?

The interior of the truck was warm, which was a definite improvement, and while it smelled a little, that was nothing Constantine was going to worry about. Besides, anything was better than outside.

John hands him a twenty. "For petrol money." He offers, with bad grace and a touch of magic.

Jack Burton takes it and sticks it in a pocket, then sucks his teeth. "Where are you going then?" He asks at last.

"Don't know yet." Constantine replies. "But I'll know the way when I see it. Yourself?" Constantine replied. Burton wouldn't believe the truth anyway; he's screwed over the White Council one time too many, and just lost his main protection. Now that they've sent wardens to make him a head shorter. He needs to give time to let tempers cool, get his protection back, then go home and weasel out of it. He's done it before.

"Got a job ferrying goods a little town in Washington. Good money." Burton replies, taking another bite of his enormous sandwich.

"Town wouldn't be called Forks, by any chance?" Constantine can't help himself asking, though he already knew. Chance. Yeah right. Chance was when a truck driver offered you a lift despite the fact you don't have boobs to flash. This was more than that. This was him being hurried along by someone or another.

He hated being used. How he hated it. As far as he was concerned, Heaven and Hell could swivel on his middle digit.

Jack's eyebrows rise all the way to his hairline, and he turns to look at John, almost forgetting the road was here. He's gone from affably disinterested to suspicious in a single instant. "Yeah. How did you know?"

John snarls. "Call it a hunch. A really good hunch. The sort of hunch that tells you someone upstairs is dicking around." He replies with a shrug. "I know that feeling very well, trust me."

Burton stares a few more moments, then turns his gaze back to look at the road. "Right. Whatever." He's unconvinced. Imagine that.

"Yeah, I don't believe it either." Constantine adds, trying without success to get his soaked cigarette to light. At last he snaps his fingers and the cigarette does, smoking far more than usual due to the damp.

"Wind a window down if you're going to do that." Jack says, still frowning, then hits the button when Constantine doesn't move. Some rain gets in, and the truck suddenly seems a lot colder. As if in mockery, the next song to play just happens to be 'Stairway to Heaven' over the crash of distant thunder.

"Well I hate you too." Constantine replies under his breath, so that even Burton misses the words.

A week later, the state highway patrol found an empty car parked on the side of the road, wheels deep in the mud. There were no fingerprints or DNA traces, but there was a single, bloody handprint on the inside of the windshield, almost three times to large, and the fingers all much to short (proportionally). No trace of the driver was ever found.

"Here you go." Burton says, stopping the truck and letting him out on the outskirts of town. The rain hasn't made it this far North yet, though the way the winds blowing he wouldn't have long to wait.

They'd talked a little on the route, but not much, and for the most part Burton had just loudly hammered his views, theories and observations at him, and Constantine had nodded at all the right times.

It wasn't as bad as it sounded. Jack was boisterous and opinionated, but genuinely funny (though not deliberately). Not too say he wasn't glad to see the back of him. Only so much of that you can take.

He was at the outskirts of a small town. He didn't know anyone, and the trail ended around here. More than that, two leylines intersected over the place, explaining the unnatural storms. And what was probably a Hellmouth too. It wasn't active, but then they . He'd have to get a roof over his head. Quickly.

Which is easier said than done when you have forty six dollars in your pocket and can't risk getting more out. The White Council wasn't good with technology. But they were very rich, and could afford to buy people who were. Taking money out here would probably be traced.

And everything was recorded these days. Everything. Can't take a piss without someone finding out about it, let alone take out money. Nobody cared about their immortal souls, but try to cheat someone a penny and see what happens.

Besides, they were everywhere. There wasn't one person in the world who didn't suspect something was going on they didn't know about to do with the supernatural. There was too much of the occult not to everyone to catch glimpses sooner or later, and it can't be explained away like government testing or backdoor deals with the Russians. Conveniently forgetting things you'd rather not know about only takes you so far. The whole idea of keeping it secret was a joke, the truth was people ignored it, didn't talk about it or got caught up in the middle of it and killed. The elephant in the dining room.

And the lovely thing about being in the middle was that both sides hate you equally. You don't get anyone to back you up against problems of this nature.

He'd always bet on long odds in the past, but only when he had his back up against a wall. And right now, he had options, or what passed for them. There had to be a hostel, or a place for back-packers, a campsite, caravan park or something like that around here. If he was really desperate, he might even pay them.

In the end, after a long walk, he finds a place that looks cheap and books a room. He doesn't have the money to pay for it after all, so, after weighing morality against sleeping outside tonight, he asks to speak to the owner.

The owner turns out to be Norman Bates, a tall, slender, somewhat good-looking man who looks like he just stepped out from an American 60's toothpaste commercial. Except for the dead eyes that bore into you, his nervous, twitchy smile and habit of scratching. He's clearly insane, or at least paranoid delusional. Then, Constantine has spent a few years of his life inside a mental asylum, so who is he to judge. As long as he keeps his craziness to himself they should get on fine.

That in mind, he hypnotizes him, convinces him he's booked a room and paid up front, and takes the key.

Making his way up the narrow stairs, he unlocks the door, steps into his room and drops his stuff on the floor with no small relief, where it won't get in the way and he can find it in a hurry. He then walks over to the bed, shrugs of his coat and lies down, savoring the feel of the bed. He's been getting by on naps for much too long. A good night sleep feels far more important then tracking right now.

He sighs again, and closes his eyes.

No. It wasn't his imagination. There was something not right about this town.


	3. Chapter 3

**Alaska**

Hellboy rolled over groggily, falling out of the too small bed and onto the floor of the too small cabin. He groaned. He had spent last night getting drunk, which had become his schedule for the last few weeks. There wasn't much to do up here, and what little you could do was only good for a few tries before it got stale. Plenty of time outdoors, appreciating the wild, untamed countryside. He was thinking of starting that novel he had always wanted to write.

Yes, it was boring, but that was the intention. It was the only place he'd found where he could just kick back and let everything drift past. Africa had allowed him to vanish, but was far from empty, and Asia was even worse. He hadn't even tried South America, he knew better than anyone the types of people already hiding out there. Besides, the whole continent was practically ruled by the Red Court. But here, in Alaska, there was peace. No monsters that he'd met, if there were they kept to themselves as much as he did. No demons. No ghosts, witches, fairies, or primordial night goddesses giving him crap or trying to get him to do things he had no interest in doing. No ancient men sustained on dark magic who had apparently waited all this time for the chance to tell him about his destiny, whether he wanted to learn or not. And after more than fifty five years of all that, Hellboy was fine with the quiet. Taking it easy was under appreciated.

He didn't even mind being alone. Sure, he'd missed Liz and Abe and the rest at first, but he got over it pretty fast. He still took the occasional call or sent the odd postcard, but once Abe left too he stopped getting replies and eventually he stopped.

Now his only human contact was limited to the store he visited on a monthly basis to buy supplies, sometimes a few lost hikers. The former he cut as tight as possible, the latter he avoided or ignored. All in all, good system. Lonely, but he was fine with his own company. His friends often made him focus on things he shouldn't.

No, he'd fallen into a routine of sorts, one that suited the life he was leading. He spent most of his time indoors, he fed the cats, he drunk more then he should, and he generally took it easy.

Leaving the BPRD had been the easiest decision that Hellboy had probably ever made. He'd pressed his locator belt into Dr Manning's arms as the man stuttered in incomprehension, retrieved his gun, and then turned his back on the life he'd lived for sixty years and the only home he'd ever known. Simple.

But it hadn't been really. Home, that is. Since Father died, it had just been something he did. No meaning, no purpose. He'd only stayed out of habit. It was, after all, the only life he'd ever known.

But he was sick of it. Sick of fighting, sick of giving for people who didn't care, or didn't even notice. So let it be someone else's burden. Once a demon, Whistler, had told him there was more evil in the world then good. He had been wrong. There was always another hero, always another savior. That's the beauty of it. His fighting was over, and the BPRD stopped calling, and here he was, at peace.

So he was very surprised when he awoke to find a big brown package tied with string on his door. How it got there was a mystery.

_I mean I have to be the only living soul for miles around, it's not like a mailman made his rounds this far North, and anyway, he'd have heard a truck or whatever. So unless it dropped out of the sky…_ He looked up just in case. No plane, helicopter or the like. Whoever left it here was long gone.

He looked down at it for a long time. Part of him, a considerable part, wanted to take his big boot and stomp on it, then go back to doing nothing. But he couldn't, much to his own self-disgust. A combination of curiosity, boredom (much as he told himself it was a good thing) and loyalty made him take the package and open it carefully.

Inside the box were six things. A plane ticket, to Washington. A page torn from a street directory, with the town 'Forks' circled. He'd heard something about that place once, but it had slipped his memory. A photo of eight figures who could have passed for fey in the right light, all looking like they just stepped from the cover of Vogue to give "their tips for a trendier you." As though autographed, a spidery hand had written names below each of the figures. A photocopy from some ancient book or another, written in a time when spelling was more or less optional. A vial of some strange substance, that reminded him of blood. It wasn't, because it didn't smell like blood, and he had plenty of experience with what blood smells like. And a newspaper article, about disappearances throughout Washington, none of which occurred in said town.

A mystery. Whoever sent this didn't actually know him very well, or they would have told him upfront what they wanted instead of this sort of crap. An endless stream of supernatural's that felt obliged to drop hints about his destiny or heritage -which he hadn't cared about to begin with- had long since obliterated any interest in puzzles he might have once possessed.

He looked at the torn page anyway, putting the rest aside. Most of it assumed you'd read the rest of the book, which he hadn't, and talked about a ritual, awakening something called 'that which was taken.' There were symbols that were probably significant to someone, but to him just so many lines. Like some glorified barcode.

Then he found the sheet of printed paper. Ah. Someone had done all the investigating after all, and needed him for the heavy lifting. He scan read it, and grumbled to himself as he did so. He had met no shortage of vampires in his line of work. Vampires were one of those supernatural's that couldn't just sit down, shut up, and leave the humans alone. They always had to do something stupid and get him involved.

He scanned the paper again, taking note of key words. Vampires. Prophesied coming. Ritual. Kidnapping. Sacrifice. It was all he needed to read.

Despite the talk of bloodlines, and Courts, and rubbish like that, none of the ones he'd ever met had seemed particularly unified or organized. The Courts seemed to just be a paper thing, in his (admittedly somewhat specialized) experience. But apparently these ones were. They were registered on the Unseelie Accords, and had a whole lot of the supernatural world's big names supporting them. Why said beings, most of whom were completely mad, evil, or both, would support this was question enough, but he had bigger problems to worry about.

Apparently, they had spent considerable resources doing what a paranoid person might identify as building an army of the supernatural acquired from a variety of long established powers. Now that got his attention.

There were a lot of vampires. More than could be counted, ranging for the Red Court serfs you could find in every city to the true ancestors who were recognized by hell, some even granted honory demon status. And they didn't get on. Some hokey ritual wasn't going to get them to work together if they didn't want to…

The overwhelming majority of Hellboy's mind said to put the box down, or punt it into a snow drift, go back inside, sleep off the hangover. But then he went through his cases. This was always how crap started: naga, skinwalkers, strix, kappa, whatever. Something small. Next thing you know, BAM, a dragon is eating children raw just to use their hair to line its nest, a bunch of Nazis are trying to restart the Third Reich or bring back Hitler's brain in a jar, or an army of frog people is on the rampage. Again.

If he was going to get involved anyway, for once it would be nice to deal with the problem before it got out of hand. And if he wasn't, well then he wouldn't have picked up the box if he wasn't going to get involved.

"Damnit." He mutters. There doesn't really seem much more to say.  
He'd recovered his long coat, beat the dust from it and hunted down the 'Good Samaritan', on the conclusion that he'd almost never complained of bringing too much fire power to kill something. He dressed, shaved his horns, and felt like himself again.

He had taken a truck to the nearest airport, which felt like days ago.

Most people thought he was a character in pulp novels like Lobster Johnson, or an urban myth, if they even knew he existed. Getting back in the country legally would be needlessly difficult. Most demons snuck on by hiding in the cargo hold. He saw no reason to break tradition here. He hadn't been found, and made himself somewhat comfortable for the long flight. Fortunately there wasn't turbulence.

From there, he got to Seattle, and it was in the back of another truck to Forks, again unnoticed as he stowed away amongst the stationary and housewares all neatly stacked and packed in boxes that were more comfortable then they looked. He was quiet. Working for the Beareu had made him good at waiting.

And All the waiting had the benefit of giving him plenty of time to think. Why was he doing this? Really? He still didn't know. He wasn't Bureau anymore, but that was hardly an excuse to leave it alone. They didn't seem to be doing anything about it.

Admittedly, somebody was trying to end the world, but so what. Someone was always trying to end the world. From what he'd seen people had been trying to end the world since day one, and hadn't had much in the way of concrete results yet.

But then, to quote the well known parable about the starfish, while the world would probably keep on turning, it mattered to the twenty or so who'd inevitably not make it through the attempt. And a large part of him didn't want to go back and get in touch with his softer side. He'd had enough of his soft side, and it had about had enough of him.

Besides, the main reason, more important then any of the others, came to the forefront and stuck. He wanted to do this.

He sat back, having done all the soul searching and introspection he was equipped to do without alcohol. It was settled. He'd be there soon. And when he got to the town, there would be hell to pay.


	4. Chapter 4

**Seattle, Washington**

_"And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free."_

You can find these words in the Gospel of John. You can also find them on the front of the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency in Langley, Virginia. Just what Jesus of Nazareth would make of this depends on whether He has a well-developed sense of irony. Judging from the course of human history, it is fair to say His Father does.

Christians came up with a corollary to this maxim: telling the truth shall set you free. All forms of the Christian faith advocate, in one form or another, the confession of sins. As he did every Sunday after the 9am Mass, Father Merrin prepared to hear confession at the Church of the Blessed Virgin. Few of the penitent faithful ever came. Few wanted to go to the trouble of seeking formal absolution. To Father Lankester Merrin, it seemed that nowadays everyone just assumed the Lord's forgiveness was automatic, like some sort of entitlement. Most of those who still came were pious elderly women whose faith was moulded by an earlier, more God-fearing era.

Father Merrin was of average size and trim, with white hair and very prominent cheekbones. His face was wrinkled, if kindly, and his brow was lined. He wore a suit jacket and jeans, and while he was a little intense most people got used to it quickly. Born in Holland, he had lived a rich and full life, had seen the world and done a lot of good, worked as a volunteer in third world countries, assisted as a teacher, a doctor, anything he could do. He had been forced to retire recently due to a heart condition, and was a priest again. But not an American priest.

He was here (In Seattle an in this country) on a favour for an old friend, one he hadn't spoken to in years. Father Jacob Fuller was on a road trip with his family as he tried to put his life into perspective and come to terms with the tragedy that had befallen his wife, spend some time with his kids and do some thinking. What he hadn't said, but was clear on his face, was that he had felt his faith slipping, and was unlikely to return. Merrin had prayed for his friend, but no good seemed to have come of it.

He hoped him all the best in his ordeal to come, but there was nothing more he could do for him.

The parish was very different from his own. Quiet most of the time, except on weddings and funerals. The only person Father Merrin expected to see soon was Father McGruder, who would assist him with the noon Mass, and perhaps Father Anderson, a visiting priest from Italy.

So the old man was surprised when a young woman entered his confessional that Sunday morning. She was small, and petite, and had a certain feline look about her, with wide, slanting eyes that didn't blink, and a heart-shaped face. Long flaming red hair, burnished copper, framed her delicate face in gentle curls, she walked with a casual self-assurance while still appearing meek and penitent.

Moving over to the box she sat herself gently, smoothing her jeans that clung to her hips as she did so, and began to speak in a low, throaty voice.

"Bless me Father for I have sinned. It has been two months since my last Confession," she began, her voice slightly husky and trembling slightly. Through the grating, he could see she was looking at her knees, and there was a glimmer of something at the corner of her eyes.

"Two months ago, the man I loved was taken from me. A long time ago, my mother and father were taken from this world. So were all of my brothers and sisters. They loved god. They were pious and gentle, and kind. They lived by His word. But he didn't lift a finger for them." She was still looking down. He thought he saw a glimmer of something in her eye, although the gating between them and the low light conditions made it difficult to be sure.

"Then my James came, and gave me a new life. We would have been together forever. Then he died, and I am empty."

"My child, I am sorry. But they are in a better place…" He said, patiently and reassuringly. Priests learn to comfort victims of tragedy. It's one of the jobs less appealing aspects.

"Quiet." She snapped, and all traces of meekness vanished like smoke. "I have killed. Men and boys, women and children. Every few nights for the last few hundred years. I have drained their blood, and cast aside their empty shells. I have murdered, and tortured, and enjoyed every second of it by my James's side. But now he is gone, taken from me by that bastard and his whore." She snarled, her face contorting. She didn't look quite so pretty now. She looked bestial, monstrous. Inhuman.

The priest leaned back, emotions flickering over his face. He had to assume the woman was crazy, or else delusional. He hoped to God the latter, but either way, she was dangerous. "My child, God has not abandoned you. No matter how grievous your sins, redemption is possible. You have shown that yourself, by coming here now, by seeking my guidance. It is not too late. Have faith, and repent," he said, his voice admirably steady.

The women laughed, in a way that was terrifying not because it was dark and inhuman, but because it was not. It was the laugh of a girl, young and carefree, who had just been told a joke.

Her delicate fingers twined around the grating that separated them, and the timber groaned in protest for a moments, then with a final, resigned crack, she tore it away. The priest fell backwards in shock, but there was a blur of movement as she caught him, stopping his descent as surely as if gravity had ceased to function.

"No!" She shouted. "It is too late. He's gone forever! There is no god. Or if there is, he doesn't care. About me. About you. I have killed. I told you as much." With no perceptible effort she drew him close until his face was inches from hers. He was gaping like a fish, breathing rapidly as perspiration beaded his brow and ran in streams down his chin, while she was cold, seeming almost detached, though her voice shook with pain and rage.

"Where was God then? Did he come and save them? Huh? DID HE?" She roared, her face still expressionless, tears in the corners of her eyes. "Did he save me? Of course he didn't!"

With a violent move she threw him aside, and he crashed against the walls of the booth with bonecracking force. He slid to the ground with a groan, still dammnedly conscious, and blearily saw her standing over him, her hands on her hips.

"You believe in God? Why? What's he ever done for you?" Drawing back a leg she kicked him in the stomach. He gasped, and felt something rupture. She drew back her leg to kick him again, but though better of it, and rested it on his chest. "He wasn't there for anyone I killed. Oh, they begged and screamed and soiled themselves and prayed, and where was he?" She tilted her head, at odds with the violence of her words. She seemed serene, almost bored, as if this whole thing didn't mean very much.

"You… you're a monster." He choked out. He was pale, and was clutching his stomach weakly, his eyes tearing in pain, and his breathing little more than a strange, wheezing, crackling sound. He wasn't afraid. He felt like he should be, but he wasn't. He was calm, accepting. This only seemed to enrage her even further.

He had seen the supernatural before. Once he'd exorcised the demon Pazuzu from a little girl that it had possessed, and the experience had almost killed him. But this was different. Worse, somehow. Because the demon had been nothing but an extension of evil, a being that had been, in it's own way, honest. This was not. He was convinced that for all her depraved power, this really was just a young girl.

"I am. I'm a vampire. You're about to die. And as far as I can see, God doesn't seem to be stepping in. This is his house. Did he step out to go for a walk? Or was he never here to begin with?"

Father Merrin's shaking hand closed around the crucifix on his neck, yanking it of its silver chain and holding it in front of him with the faith of the desperate, his lips desperately forming the opening of the Lord's Prayer.

"My father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, for –"

She flicked her head to one side and pulled the cross out of his hand. For a moment she seemed to flinch, but it must just have been his imagination, because she brought the silver a few inches from her face, kissed it, then threw it aside. "I told you. There. Is. No. God. You've dedicated yourself to a lie. You're a seventy year old virgin who likes to make old ladies feel guilty, not a priest. Telling a lie over and over again, wasting away your existence."

She picked him up again, her eyes as dark as the void between stars, burning with a terrible hunger and hate. She opened her mouth, and the poor Father noticed how sharp and glistening her teeth were.

"Will you look at that? He doesn't seem to care about you either. God, if you will let me kill this priest, make no sign." She said, waiting an instant, baring her teeth again. "What do you know? Nothing. He doesn't exist. "

"Ah hae ta' disagree thar, lass." A deep, rolling Scottish brogue interrupted, and the monster was lifted easily and thrown aside to crash into the pews, splintering several rows beneath her with the weight of her impact.

She rolled sluggishly to her feet, looking shocked.

Father Merrin never really quite understood his Scottish colleague. He now was starting to understand why. Father Anderson was enormous; he had to be closer to eight feet then seven. He was extremely heavily built, with broad shoulders and thick forearms, which seemed more at place on a stevedore than a man of the cloth. He had always seemed as gentle as a lamb, good with children and quick to laugh.

It was almost impossible to reconcile that image to the grim figure standing in front of him with all the strength, power and conviction of an old testament prophet. His smile, that had always seemed so kindly and gentle, had promised nothing but love and happiness to the world. This was a very different grin, a pearly white perfect grin that had no pity or compassion, a grin of one who cannot be deterred, swayed or defeated. And the fact that the glare off his glasses made his eyes look not like eyes, but rather opaque, soulless, circles only made matters worse. Anderson seemed powerful, unflinching and unstoppable.

He stared at the vampire, and it seemed the height of folly that such a little thing like that could have had him so much in its power only moments ago.

"He cares, in hi' own way." continued Father Anderson, glasses shining like mirrors. "Sae dinnae worry, fer He is wit' ye. Do nae be afraid, fer He is ye're God. He will make ye strong, an' will help ye when ye need it most. He will support ye with His right hand, and He will save ye from any peril." He says, quoting Isaiah, Reynolds slow, barely conscious mind observes. A bayonet slides down Anderson's right hand from his sleeve, which he points at the vampire.

"Amen."


	5. Chapter 5

My apartment is almost as nice as my office. Furniture that doesn't match, exposed concrete walls, cheap shelving and ordered chaos, the place would make the average interior designer take cyanide, or at least hemlock. Half-mouldy couches that children could drown in, rugs from different eras (I particularly enjoyed the peace sign next to the 50s tartan, and my two Elvis rugs. The King is like an old, old friend) thrown everywhere to try and insulate the room from the cold, posters advertising everything from Star Wars (I have an original 1970s) to Spider-Man, and a kitchen that has no stove, fridge, or vegetables, but does have an old fashioned icebox and a microwave that sees a lot of use. It's a place I like happen to call home. And, as proof of the adaptability of the human spirit, I've come to like it the way it is.

It smells mostly of smoke and incense, strongly of cat and must, slightly of bananas and the air is always freezing. I like to say it's got personality. Well, I did until my brother told me just how sad that sounds.

Now I usually mumble something and change the subject.

Heading down to my lab, I put the heavy bathrobe I wear for warmth over the top of my jeans and flannel. Yes, I know I'm playing to type, but I've got a reason: it is _cold_ down there. No central heating, two floors underground and bare stone floors. Trust me; some traditions, like wizards in robes, are plain old common sense. Just the same, I don't wear the hat. I do have my pride. And besides, the ones at Party City are crap.

"Bob!" I call out. My skull doesn't respond. He's having a moment. The smart thing to do would be to wait a while and try again, sparing myself some aggravation, or at the very least reasonably request he helps me out, and maybe lay on the praise. Bob is always a sucker for praise.

I suppose everyone who accuses me of needlessly complicating things and making it difficult for myself has got a better point then I like to admit.

Instead of either of those options I wave my hand in front of his empty eye sockets and shout at him until I'm red in the face, yelling orders, threats I have no idea if I could actually carry out and everything else that crosses my mind, and at last my very own spirit of air and intellect bestirs itself.

Bob is perhaps the most irritating being in the universe, and the fact that I need him to function only makes matters worse. Some advice, if there is somebody you can't stand; don't let him get a hold over you, and never become dependent on them..

"All right!" Bob's eyelights flamed like tiny blue supernovae, as the skull quivered. "What the hell is it with you, Harry?"

"Stop whining, Bob. It's not funny, it's not clever, and it's not going to get you out of doing this." I took out a relatively fresh notepad and pen. I'd cleared a space yesterday, so I didn't need to worry about knocking anything delicate off the table. For about the billionth time. Instead, I had to worry about stepping on something delicate that had been placed on the floor to make room on the desk.

"What's in it for me?" Bob asked, still not being helpful. "I mean, I'm starved for any new material here, and there is the loveliest Italian on this month's Hustler with pouty lips and the firmest pair of –"

"A sense of job satisfaction's all you're getting, Bob." I interrupt, wondering how my walking talking reference guide can possibly be attracted to human women as I always do, before I snap out of it. Just as well; that reasoning takes me down paths the sane should fear to tread. "I've got a couple of hours before I try to get some sleep, and then I'll be out of here for a while. So I'm not going to waste time humouring you."

"Or talking to me as it turns out." His eyelights start to dim.

"Bob!" I say, this time in the voice I use to intimidate suspects. I've gotten fairly good at it, all it took was practicing in front of the mirror and asking Murphy for advice. Thank god for that. First time I tried it, the con burst out laughing.

"Alright then. Fine. What do you want?" Bob says, apparently deciding to cut our usual banter short. Perhaps he senses my urgency. More likely, he just wants to get back to sleep. Not complaining, of course. Actually I wish he was always this easy to get to open up.

"Vampires. I've been hired to track some down. I don't know what kind, and my employer… hinted that I would probably have to kill them. I don't know how I feel about that, though they probably deserve it."

"Huh." I think I detect a glimmer of interest, although I can't be sure. It isn't as if I haven't asked him about vampires before. "Well, faith, sunlight, fire, wooden stakes, decapitation. That about covers the Red Court. Black Court as well, and most of that will do the trick on regular humans. too. White Court is a bit trickier of course, but I'm sure your brother can help you out as you need. Jade Court vamps, or Jiang Shi if you want to be precise, are more zombie then vampire, more animal then either. They're very hard to kill, but not as dangerous as the regular kind for the most part. Fling sticky rice at them and they'll weaken, pin a banishment spell on their forehead will get rid of them for good, no particular one, whatever you think will work. Ba-qua mirrors are their sunlight, and of course you can always hack them to bits. They'll put themselves back together next full moon unless you have the right sort of sword, but it's the thought that counts."

I'm a little curious. I've never actually met a member of the Jade Court, but I've heard them mentioned a few times. Not much, apparently they're a secretive bunch, but enough. "So how do they form a court if they're stupid?"

"Oh, that's just the newborns. Once they eat a victim, they add the strength and power to their own. They also gradually gain intelligence. Not a lot, it's about twenty victims for one IQ point, but some of them are genius level, and according to the law of averages…"

He trails off. I let him. The idea of an ancient corpse, gorged on an untold number of victims and more powerful than most gods is a sobering thought. Why is it always the bad guys or crazy ones who get to become ancient beings that have transcended all limitations and hit these points? I could really use one on my side for a change. Maybe I should try being nicer at parties. Or something. If I ever get invited to one again, whenever I do find myself at those sort of soirées, things tend to blow up.

"Anyway, the Black Court are easiest around, anyone who has read Bram Stoker and has a few minutes to prepare could kill a Black Court vampire. That's why the book was written, a 'how-to guide' you might say. 'Course they have plenty of magic to work with, and tend to be smarter than the rest. That's just natural selection at work; the White Court's little antics wiped out all most of the dumb ones, and human hunters got the rest. Besides, unlike the other species they don't have a high rate in reproducing, so you have to be pretty exceptional to become one in the first place even without their standards. Except for Wights, but they're only dangerous if you don't know what you're up against and they have serious numbers. To become a Black Court vampire, you have to be a virgin, pure of heart, and you have to agree to the change, understanding just what it will entail and without any of the 'fluence edging you along, and drink the court members blood. Otherwise you become a Wight, which is basically an advanced zombie."

I already know that. I dealt with a nest of them once, with the help of a singularly amoral bounty hunter and my closest and dearest friend. Staking and decapitation sound so easy until you try to actually do it.

Bob is warming to his subject. Once you get him talking he never stops. "Vampire Lords are best left well enough alone, trust me on that one. Never met one, but I've seen what they can do, and it's not pretty. . Also, anything with a strange name with lots of V's and G's in it should be avoided at all cost. Trust me on that, Harry. Now if you're talking Silver Court…"

Hold on. What? "What the hell is the Silver Court?"

"Nobody's quite sure. They're not conventional vampires anyway. More fey, if anything. They're apparently descended from the White Court and the children that got replaced with changelings. They have their own court, but it's not much on influence compared to the others. They're tough, as you can imagine, but -"

"Hold on. How many goddamn types of vampires are there?" I don't like vampires. The literary genre alone was bad enough to all that is decent. The fact that the White Council was at war with them a few years ago and that they stole and half-turned my girlfriend wasn't icing on the cake. It was a pretty damn good reason to hate them actually, and that was only the start of the sheer number of atrocities to lay at their feet. But even without that that personal grievances I'd still hate them. Just the idea of them is bad enough. You see, I like humans. I don't like things who think of them as prey.

"Thousands. Hard to get an exact number, Dresden, the line's a little blurry where one ends and another begins. But they're mostly extinct, or good as. There are only really the five Courts, and only three of them which have much influence out of their circles. Well, two now, the Black Court's all but extinct. Not completely, if you mess with any of them their elders will pop you like a tick, but that's about the extent of their clout. Other then that, you know, some individuals, a few towns with a terrible secret, a few some solitary clans hanging on by their fingertips, and one or two individuals and ancestors left. Most aren't really worth bothering with, it's only the organized ones that matter."

"Figures." I grumble, irritated more then I should be. Five courts. Why does no one tell me these things? "So tell me about this Silver Court."

"Well, they really only exist as a puppet regime by the Black Court. They're not numerous enough or influential enough to do otherwise, and the Black Court is not interested in ruling directly, as they have enough trouble keeping dissidents under control as it is. The Silver Court don't have anything much in the way of natural magic, they can't even learn much. They are inhumanly attractive of course, feel like they're made of cold marble and are just as hard, sparkle in the sunlight –"

"What the hell?"

"Keep interrupting and you won't get any sleep tonight." Bob replies. "They sparkle in the sunlight, like millions of diamond facets. I have no idea why, who knows why the fey do anything, but I suppose the Sidhe thought it was funny. They just love jokes. As long as it's someone else who looks stupid, anyway… water under the bridge. As for capabilities, they are fast, strong and hard to kill. A bit stronger and faster than a Slayer; usually not as skilled though. Or as…" He sees my expression and gets back to the point.

"They can put themselves back together, unless you burn them. They don't have the usual weaknesses, faith holds them away but that's about it, iron doesn't worry them, and running water isn't a problem because they don't actually have much magic. They don't even have the usual problem with thresholds, so they're essentially all of the strengths, none of the weaknesses. Of course having clearly defined limits isn't good news in the supernatural world."

I sigh. Well, that's about as far from good news as you can get. Wednesday didn't specify which kind, but I have a sneaking suspicion…

"Where do the Silver Court hang their capes and keep their coffins?" I ask, already suspecting I knew the answer.

"Mostly in Italy. They enjoyed the irony."

Damn. Well then, no lead here, back to square one. Could be an unknown, could be representatives from all the courts, could be something I'd never heard of. All I know is he thinks they are strange, which hardly narrows the distinction. Maybe I should just call my old mentor and ask him if he's got any more handy satellites to drop. The image cheers me up, as it always does, though it was more than a little callous. We argued about that for a long time.

"Anything else, Harry?"

"Yeah." Now comes the really hard bit. "What can you tell me about Odin."

It takes a moment to sink in, and then the skull quakes. He actually does. ""You can't be serious."

"'Fraid so." I reply, doing my best to appear unconcerned about the whole thing. A seven year old child might be convinced. If they were especially naïve.

"Stars and stones, Harry. Just how do you get into this sort of thing?" Bob replies, a mix of awe and naked shock in it voice.

"It always seems like such a good idea at the time." I reply in an emotionless deadpan. Truth is, I don't know either. I start investigating a case, and it leads somewhere like this.

"You're sure it's Odin? Not some spirit who thinks you'll be more impressed if he drops a big name?"

"No. That's why I'm asking." I reply. I'd never met the old god before, which suited us both as far as I knew. But I knew people that had, people who called him boss. A Valkyrie mercenaries named Sigrun, working for 'Gentleman' Marcone in particular. The Crime Boss seemed to be in with them. Unfortunately, while we have helped each other out a few times, we're not on good terms, so I can't exactly call them her up and ask for news. "But if it is, and I admit it is an if, then why did he come to me?"

"Charity case?"

"Hilarious." I reply, making sure he'd get it by being more sarcastic then usual.

"Well I'm serious. They say he used to start wars, and was happy with either conclusion. After all, whichever side wins, people die and he gets fighters to use at Ragnorak. Maybe you're an investment. Or just expendable."

Ouch. That hit the bone right there. "Alright. That makes sense. But why does he care about a bunch of vampires? He's a god, they're not in his ballpark, nor his league, or hell, even playing the same game."

"You're the detective, you tell me."

Right. Good answer there, Bob. I get up, and look down at my pitifully inconclusive notes. Nothing. I'm going to be playing this one blind.

"Oh, Harry?" Bob asks, sounding contrite, sorry, and genuine as a nine dollar bill.

"Yeah?"

"Any chance you'll let me out?"

"Goodnight, Bob."

"But Harry" Bob whined. "What am I supposed to do for a week while you're gone? At least get me a new romance! Something? Even send me to Thomas's? Please?"

I ignore him, closing the door behind me, and sigh. I'm not going to get any sleep tonight.

The next day came far faster than it was supposed to. I did manage to get some sleep after all, which tells you just how jaded I've become to life or death situations. Of course, my dreams weren't great. Mostly memories, mixed up with what I was thinking of. The resulting stew was indistinct, shadowy shapes prowling through my apartment, laughing as they shredded people I knew with shocking detail while I watched impassively. Red eyes were involved as well, and so was a toaster, although I can't be certain exactly where that last one fit in. By the time I'd untangled the covers and staggered into the bathroom to shave and brush my teeth all I could really remember were the eyes. But somehow they were bad enough.

I fixed breakfast, got dressed, and before I could take so much as a bite the phone rang. With a sigh, I got to my feet and walked over to appease it.

I picked it up, and marvelled at the lack of static. If this goes on I might even get some lights in the place one of these days. Murphy was on the other end, and sounding frustrated. However, I felt nothing but elation. I'd much rather be working with Murphy and actually helping people then doing dirty work for the old bastard who showed up yesterday, god or not.

"Harry, what have you been up to?" She accuses. Well, strictly speaking she asks, but the intent was clear. Not the most auspicious of starts. I like Murphy, and I know she wouldn't suspect me unless she had was reasonably certain I'd done something. So letting my mouth run off would not do any good, in fact it would only damage our friendship. Instead I try to be reasonable.

"Nothing you don't know about, Murphy." I say, completely honestly. But my brain is running a mile a minute trying to figure out what I might have done. Strange thing is, I can't think of anything. Recently.

"Well then, I'm sure you'll be as shocked as me when I tell you that two men in tweed suits and another in an Armani arrived half an hour ago with orders for you to be arrested, and your rights as a citizen withheld. That jog your memory?" She says, not giving an inch.

That gets my attention. "What? Why?" I say, my breathing picking up. That is bad. That is bad. That is very, very bad. "Who are they? Secret Service?"

"I don't know. But they were able to bypass regular channels and they have a piece of paper approved by Homeland Security. This is serious Harry."

"You're telling me?" I say incredulously. I like to believe in democracy. So when this sort of thing happens I get annoyed. Then something occurs to me. "Murphy. Should you be talking to me?"

"You're my friend." I've said it before, and I'll say it again, Murphy is good people. Here she is putting her career, and all sorts of things that I don't want to think about on the line for my sake. I felt some warm gushy feelings at that moment I don't mind telling you about, but they were overshadowed by good old-fashioned self-interest rearing its ugly head.

"Thank you, Murphy. How long do I have?"

"Ten minutes. If that."

I offer goodbye quickly, and hang up, then feel my legs weaken. I need to sit down. I need to think. But I can't, because I don't have time. Instead I pace, indecision making my brain fire of thoughts in every direction and not reach conclusions on any of them.

What should I do? And why do all these problems arrive at the same time? Why can't I sort them out one at a time? Should I wait? The innocent have nothing to fear, but if they just want to talk or want me to do a job they wouldn't imprison me. I think.

So what could they want? And who are they? Nothing good, I'll bet.

Were they legitimate? Was one of my enemies more influential then I feared? Was this all a big mistake? Was I about to be disappeared? I didn't know. And that made me far more nervous then I would have been if I had some sort of target, some idea of who was behind this.

Should I resist, or go quietly? Or should I run? I didn't want to make the decision.

And I didn't have to. Right on schedule, someone knocks on my door. And sure enough, looking through the peephole I see Wednesday.


	6. Chapter 6

As it turned out, Wednesday drove, or at least was currently driving, a silver Charger. The old fashioned sort, made in the glory days of American automobile manufacturing, back when the Japanese and Europeans didn't make it over the ocean. Despite it's obvious age, it was perfectly preserved, as though it had just come off the factory floor hours ago. It was a very nice machine, actually, if a bit too old school for someone like me to pull off. However, it's even less subtle then my Blue (well, originally blue, now with so many replacement panels of various shades it could hardly be called that) Volkswagen.

"Very retro. And a nice big windscreen so you can sneer at all the people who aren't as cool as you." I said, reluctantly opening my door and stepping out, my bag in one hand, my staff, wand and assorted paraphernalia all bundled in the other. "Totally radical. Off the heazy. Groovy. Dazzle your razzle yo."

Wednesday didn't say anything, he just got in the car, sat back, and waited patiently for me to follow, his eye flickering closed, while the glass sphere sat dead in the other.

Shame. I was just getting started with the out-dated slang.

What exactly do you do in this situation? He was offering me an escape. Not one I'd pick, but my back wasn't exactly breaking under the weight of all my options. Sure, I'd be 'Harry Dresden, fugitive' instead of 'Harry Dresden, wizard' until it all got cleared up, but that seemed far better then being 'Harry Dresden, missing, presumed dead', or 'Harry Dresden, terrorist, trial pending'. I wasn't sure that the government actually did make people vanish into black bags, but it was easy to believe they were capable of it. So I have authority issues. Deal with it.

So, even though I knew that this was a bad idea, that trusting a man who claimed to be a god of war, magic and death could not end well, and that I was running from my problems and letting the bullies plow over me (which I'd spent my entire life hating the idea of doing), and even though what Ebenezer claimed was my burgeoning second sight screamed at me this was a bad, bad idea, I got into the car.

When I say it like that it sounds as though I did something incomprehensibly stupid. But trust me, it's more complicated then it sounds, and people make mistakes under pressure. Don't get me wrong, I'd stand up to anything but the mortal authorities. Demons, dragons, vampires or whatever. Those were things I knew how to deal with, because they lay within my area of expertise.

But the mortal authorities were different. I couldn't go in there staff a'blazing. I might be a wizard, but no matter how wise and subtle I might be, a bullet between the eyes would seriously cramp my style. The White Council wouldn't and couldn't protect me, there was an unspoken law in supernatural agencies that you do not involve mortals in your feuds. History had a way of showing that when anyone did do that, they would burn everyone one involved to the ground, and not worry too much who was responsible.

And, unlike most supernatural agencies, mortals had no inclination to play fair. I was scared, but more then that, I was desperate. I'd had run ins with the law a few times before. I've even been a murder suspect a time or two. And going quietly had never accomplished anything. My best bet was to find out what they wanted, settle it myself and wait for it all to blow over. To do that, I had to get away, get more time, and find someway to get out of this. Any port in a storm.

This was not like my previous problems with the authorities. It was a real upgrade, orders of magnitude higher. This was not a case of mistaken identity, or me not telling Murphy the whole story. This wasn't Rudolph spreading around his spite to cover his own inadequacies. This was something altogether more serious.

"Just drive." I said, stubbornly not looking at him. Wednesday only shrugged, turned the key, and waited as the car hummed, then roared to life. He waited a moment, and then pulled away from my house. I knew I wouldn't see it again for a while. I wouldn't see Thomas (who I'd written a note for), I wouldn't see Murphy, I wouldn't see Bob, or Mister, Mouse, or anyone else until I found a way to clear my name, and finish this job.

It made me worried, all of a sudden, but I knew it was for the best. A note. I should have left a note. I should have packed up the more questionable materials and possessions I owned, some of which were illegal. I'd taken the time to grab some clothes, my staff and blasting rod, my charms and amulets and ring Thomas to ask him to take care of Mouse and Mister without going into specifics, but in a few days my threshold would be gone, and there were things in my apartment I didn't want getting out, not least of which being the silver denarius in my basement. It would be alright. I hoped.

Wednesday interrupts my consideration of it all by reaching past me and turning on the radio. There was static, but he left it at that. I turned the dial, and found a station. Justin Beiber was singing something. Don't look at me, I don't know what. I'm in my late forties, and far out of his target audience demographic. It would be scary if I did know.

Wednesday sneers. **"Pop music? I hate it. A couple of pretty adolescents of all ages with passable voices crooning words they think are profound but can't make themselves believe or even understand. Throw in some basic musical accompaniment, that's the same no matter who's singing, and it's done. People listen to for the feelings they can't feel in their own empty lives. Humans selling cheap, mass-produced emotions to each other, looks like the American Dream doesn't have far to go."** That's what he said, though I don't remember asking for his opinion on the state of modern society. Just the same, he didn't turn the radio off.

"Well, I happen to like it." I replied, and kept a straight face. Hey, what else are you supposed to say to an opening like that? Besides, he needed his ego pricked, and nobody was better suited for that then me. "Sure, he's hardly a virtuoso, but there is enough dark things in the world. What's wrong with a slightly naïve kid reminding us that there are things worth living for too?"

Wednesday took his one good eye off the street to look at me. A different sort of man would have apologized, but Wednesday's entire expression made it plain how little he cared about my opinion on music. I've traded quips with the best, and I'm not particularly self-conscious, but somehow that look made my face burn.

I shut up.

The man who calls himself Wednesday turns back to the road, changing lanes a few times, then turns off the main road and into some back streets. It's a rough part of town, but at this time of day it's practically deserted. For want of something to occupy myself with, I flick the radio until Tchaikovsky comes on, which he seems satisfied with, and I figure could be worse. He does not offer any further opinions.

"So, are you a god?" I ask. "Bill Murray would warn you to say yes, by the way."

"**You seem to have made up your mind."** He replies, and that's all the confirmation I needed.

"So what does Odin want with Chicago's only practicing wizard?"

The man who calls himself Wednesday parks the car without answering, and gets out. He stretches, adjusts his suit, and then walks towards a bar.

MacAnally's tavern was tucked neatly and comfortably beneath one tall building and surrounded by plenty of others. You had to go down an alley to get their, and despite it's dinky little parking lot there was never room to leave your car for a couple of streets. Of course, there was for Wednesday, though the time of day might have had something to do with that.

He hadn't actually told me to come or follow him, but that was his intention, I'm sure. Again, that strong, rational desire to refuse. I didn't, more the fool Dresden. I'd followed him this far, it was too late to back out of my decision now.

Wednesday walked down a small flight of steps down to a heavy wooden door. He waited a moment for me to catch up, then pushed it open into a quiet buzz of activity.

Let me get something straight. It's a tavern. Not a bar. Not a pub. A real, old-world-style, tavern. The tavern was old, lit by a dozen candles and kerosene lamps, and smelled of woodsmoke, old whiskey barrels, fresh bread, and the steaks and bacon that Mac was even now cooking for his heavenly sandwiches. There was a sense of security and reliability to the place, that I always found comforting.

Thirteen wooden pillars, each one hand-carved with swirling leaves, ancient runes from several languages and all a manner of graven images of beasts and I've only heard of in tale and fantasy, held up the low ceiling. Thirteen ceiling fans turned in lazy spirals at different speeds. Thirteen tables were scattered unevenly, almost chaotically around the room, and, in case you need help with pattern recognition, there were thirteen barstools.

The place was masterfully feng shuied to ground magical forces. It wouldn't do much against a direct attack, but it did ground energies that just happened to be hanging around magical types, which was just as well.

There is not even a Juke Box, though on special occasions Mac has a piano player to provide some ambiance. He was rolling over the keys right now, a nice, catchy beat that was probably some long forgotten theme song to an old show. I recognize the player, Bart, who's a magician. Not an actual magic practitioner, I've tested him a few times and he couldn't use magic to turn cereal into breakfast, but he has a real talent for Prestidigitationand slight of hand. He busks on the side of the road most days. Nice guy, but he cheats at cards.

"Play it again, Sam." He groans and rolls his eyes. Believe it or not, everyone doesn't appreciate my rapier wit. Alas it is the lot of wizards to be misunderstood and

A sign on the wall proclaimed ACCORDED NEUTRAL TERRITORY. That meant that the signatories of the Unseelie Accords, including the White Council, the Blackened Denarians, The Red Court, The White Court, the Black Court, and The Iscariot, The Faerie Courts, the Nina, the Pinta, the Santa Maria, and everyone else with the clout to get a say in the decision, then had it ratified by the Watch, formerly agreeing this place was off limits, and to be treated with respect, and god help you if you didn't, because nobody else would when they shut you down _hard_.

That meant if you did have to fight, take it outside the tavern.

There was already a small crowd. For me, this was barely past breakfast time, but the supernatural world keeps strange hours, as you might expect. A few tables were occupied. They looked up, and, recognizing me, hurriedly looked down again. People have been giving me a wide berth since I became a Warden. For once, I was grateful. I suspected I was here to make a very dodgy deal indeed, and didn't want anyone paying too close attention. I have my pride, as much as everything else.

Wednesday stepped over to the mostly deserted bar, catching Mac the barman's eye straightaway. Before I did, I might add, and I've known Mac for years. Good for him, though I hadn't really expected anything different.

Mac was one of those men who started looking venerable and experienced at twenty five and stay that way as long as they live. He was bald and made for it, he wouldn't be Mac if he wasn't. He was wearing a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, an apron that remained spotless despite the grease, drinks, and whatever else was back there, and was minding the stove. Wednesday waved him over.

Turning to me, he asked, in a slightly different voice **"Do you like mead?"** Before I could answer, Wednesday nodded to Mac, who shook his head and held up his empty hands. Man of few words, was Mac.

Wednesday met his eyes, and then tapped the side of his head. **"Take another look. Humor me."** Mac held his gaze a moment, lowered it, then shrugged, turning to go into the backroom to arrange it. Wednesday stared at him for another moment, then took a table near the door. I noticed he had his back to a wall, as though afraid someone would sneak up on him.

Wednesday leans back on his chair and begins idly tracing squat, blocky rune-like shapes in some spilled salt. I don't recognize any of them. Sure, I'm a wizard, but I learned Latin from a correspondence course, and ancient Mesopotamian or Norwegian or whatever else the hell that was lay a bit out of my area of expertise. People think wizards know everything and speak every ancient language, but they're harder to learn then people think, and I have better things to do.

"**You know,"** Wednesday observes, as I set down facing him. I wanted to keep the table between us, and I wanted to be able to watch him so I'd know if he made any sudden moves. There's enough room in the bar for two paranoids. **"The greatest line of poetry in the history of this damn country was said by Canada Bill Jones in 1853. He was in Baton Rouge, where he was loosing his shirt and everything else in a crooked game of Faro. Now a man named George Devol, who, like everyone else in the place had fleeced the odd sucker now and again, took pity on Canada Bill, drew him aside and asked him if he couldn't see the game was crooked. And Canada Bill only sighed, shrugged his shoulders and said 'I know. But it's the only game in town.' And he went back to it."**

I didn't really know where to go with that, so I grunted, and drummed my fingers on the tabletop, hoping he'd get to the point. Amusing anecdotes aside, I wanted to be out of Chicago, on the job, away from the shadowy men who want to take me aside, and find out what Wednesday wanted with me. Wednesday chuckled for both of us, then turned to check on Mac.

**"Now, let's discuss the terms."** Wednesday said out of nowhere, sounding somewhat professional again. **"You work for me. I'll pay you... five thousand a week. As to benefits, I'll arrange accommodation, any supplies you want, and all the rest. I'll keep you off the radar, and keep you safe from your enemies. In return, you do what I tell you. You drive my cars, arrange my meals, hurt people if, and only if, they need to be hurt, occasionally talk to people and investigate. And, if one of us fucks up and something does happen to me, you hold vigil, and once that's out of the way, make sure that whoever is responsible ends up dead."** He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a thick wallet. **"Agreed?"**

I pause. I've been offered deals that were far more tempting. But most of them were distasteful. This was not distasteful, it was plain insulting. Yes, I like money, and my career has been especially less then lucrative recently, but there were limits. "I told you. I am an investigator. I investigate. That is what I do." I was stressing the point to make sure he got it this time. "Drive your own damn car."

"**Attitude like that, can't believe you're out of work."** He replies, continuing to trace the runes without taking his eyes off me.

"Actually I'm meeting a client right now. He said something about five grand a week and all expenses paid." I reply. "I'm not going to be your flunky. I'm not even going to stay around you if any alternative presents itself. But I'll do your job. On my terms. And it will stay on my terms, whatever you pay me."

Mac showed up again, a tray held in one hand, balancing two long glasses of golden liquid without ice, looking a little confused as to how they got there. If they appeared the way I think they did, then it's a trick I wouldn't mind knowing myself. But I decided, right then and there, that I wasn't going to pry. At the moment, anyway. There was plenty of time for that later.

Mac put the glasses in front of us, and stood up, not going anywhere for the moment. Wednesday took both glasses, and, after a moment's examination, pushed one over the table to me, before taking his own and swirling it in his paw.

Wednesday looks up. **"And what terms are they?"** He asks, sounding merely curious.

I put it aside for the moment. "I'm not cooking for you, and I'm not driving you around. You want someone to do that, you hire someone else. The rest is fine. But I decide who needs to be hurt. Not you. So what now?"

"**Agreed." **He says, pausing to consider the offer a moment.** "Well then, ****McAnally's ****is the place, and mead is traditional. Now drink. Mead. Honey wine. The drink of heroes and Gods." **That said, he takes his own glass and drains it in a single gulp. He puts the empty frosted glass back on Mac's tray, and waves him away. **"Get me a Jack Daniels to wash it down." **If I tried to do that I'd look like a jerk, but he pulled it off.

I look at the drink. A tawny golden colour, thick and sluggish. "Bit early in the day for alcohol, isn't it?" Particularly on an empty stomach, though I didn't mention that aloud.

"**No such thing. Drink it." **He was pushing me, though he didn't act like it. Just said what he expected to happen, then waited for it to do as he said.

I took a cautious sip. It was an odd blend of sweet and sour, but I could taste the alcohol underneath. Maybe Mac had spoiled me in the drinks department with the beer he brewed, best I'd ever had by the way, but I felt a strong urge to push it away.

Wednesday noted my distaste.** "Yeah. It's piss. I hate the stuff." **He said lazily, risking insulting Mac and quite ruining the mysterious thing he's got going if you asked me.** "But it's traditional. And we need all the tradition we can get. That's our bargain sealed."**

"We haven't made a bargain." I replied, perhaps a bit too defensively. I just wanted to make that clear.

"**Yes we have. You're going to work for me. That's bargain enough for me. That's bargain enough for both of us**." Wednesday smiled. He wasgood at it, even though he had no shred of humour, mirth or happiness when he did it, you still wanted to smile with him.

"Oh." I left it at that. That was hardly a bargain, and not where I thought it was going. Soon as he said the word bargain, I was half expecting him to say that I'd agreed give him possession of my soul or something by taking the drink. That's how these sort of people tend to operate in my experience, you make what you think is a harmless agreement and suddenly you've given them possession of your soul. I finished my drink, grimacing slightly as it slid down my throat like treacle, and put down the glass, solemnly vowing to never touch the stuff again as long as I lived.

"**Well then."** He spat in his hand and offered it to me. I hesitated a moment, then spat in my hand the same way and clasped his.

"What the hell." He started to squeeze. I squeezed back, but old man or not he had a grip like a vice, and my hand started to hurt as my knuckles crunched together. I strained but he didn't budge or ease the pressure, and held it almost a minute before he let go.

I was perceptive enough to realize that was more then a testosterone fuelled dick measuring contest, but I only scowled at him.

Mac returned with the Jack Daniels, one of the few brands he carried, which Wednesday drained the same way, then sent him off again. **"Good. Very good. One more glass of evil, vile, drunk diabetic piss mead for both of us to seal the compact, and we're done."**

Mac must have agreed with Wednesday's sentiments regarding the stuff, because he winced sympathetically then went to get it. Wednesday leaned back and stared at me, expression inscrutable.

"Do we have to?" I said with a singular lack of enthusiasm. I'd be up for fighting a bear with my bare hands in that moment if it meant I could avoid the drink. It wasn't bad, per say, but it was extremely cloying and unpleasant, and sat on the stomach like molten lead.

"**Yes." **He replied, firm and unyielding. There was no way around him on this. This ritual was too important. Though it was lost on me.

"Shit." Glad I didn't make that promise aloud, or I'd be siphoning away my power or next to no reason. Taking the glass from Mac, I tried to swallow it quickly so I wouldn't have to taste it. It didn't work, and left a sour after-taste in my mouth.

Wednesday drunk his with the same ease he'd displayed last time, and then had another Jack Daniels to wash it down. He was drinking pretty heavily if you asked me, four drinks in five minutes and it's barely breakfast time. No wonder he needed a driver. I kind of doubted he'd seen my car somehow, or he wouldn't be so keen to hand me over the keys to his.

"**Well then. That's us done." **And just like that, he snapped some bills on the table without counting them, then started to stand up to leave.

"Ah, no. No it's not. You haven't actually told me a thing." I replied. "Forks. Vampires. Why do you care, why do you need me, what's so important?"

"**I've told you all you have to know, Dresden. You got a job, now you know what it is. The rest isn't important."**

"Like hell. I'm an investigator. How am I supposed to investigate if you won't tell me what I'm looking for or what I'm trying to find? For god sakes, I'm a wizard and I still hate this cryptic bullshit." He'd just reminded me that I'd decided to hate him.

"**Patience. I'll tell you everything as it comes significant. For now, be glad that you know all you need to."**

"Which is whatever you decide to drop a vague hint and string me along, is it?" He was starting to get me annoyed. And I shoot off my mouth in a way I really shouldn't. Wedneday hadn't done anything overt, but I'm a good judge of character, and he had the swagger of a champion. Antagonizing him seemed to me to be a good way to get spilled all over town.

But all the uncertainty, the doubt, the nervousness and fear that had been shoved into two days spilled out. A god, the government wanting to detain me, and now here I am, and I just needed to vent. "You seem to think that all you have to do is say jump and I'll throw myself off a cliff. Well to hell with that. I'm sure you have power, and wisdom, and all that crap, but I'm not going to let you use me just because you say your Odin."

"**I never said that."**

"Right, you didn't spell it out for me. I'd be a pretty poor investigator if I didn't see through that, so I can only assume you intended that. A test?"

"**Probably. Most things are. Now shut up. Men in this country need to learn to suffer in silence."**

"Not until I get some answers."

"**Fine. A family got a hold of one of those forbidden books that have a mind of their own. They read enough to have some ideas, and want a new God. A real big, nasty bastard, to eat the sun and give them free reign here on earth. Problem is, God's are not born, they are made. Now, I'd rather they didn't move up to the heavy weights, barely enough humans to go around between us as it is. I don't interfere directly, but I'm sure you already know that, so you get to be my patsy. If anything does happen to you, The White Council will investigate and they'll sort it out for me. But you seem to have a limitless reservoir of sheer dumb luck, and I want that working for me. Satisfied?" **He takes a certain cynical pleasure in telling me that. I can hear it in his every word.

Well. That was direct and specific, you have to give him that. I didn't believe him for an instant that all he wanted was to stop the monster of the week, but the rest had a certain believability to it, much as any of these situations make sense. And I'd seen the Darkhallow ritual almost performed. I had no desire to see it's equivalent make it past the keeper. "You don't cut off the small talk by halves, do you? So how do they intend to do that?"

"**Not the sort of knowledge I care to spread around, Dresden."**

"But it's bad, I imagine?" Still fishing, I know, but if an investigator can't ask questions, who can?

"**Pretty much, bad enough."** He replies. **"Though I've seen people sing to me as they spill blood like water and laugh while they are hacked to pieces, so excuse me if I don't really understand your modern sentiments. To be honest, most morality passes me by."**

"I don't buy it." I paused. "I take it that you're self-interested, but that doesn't explain why you can't just smite them. Or why you believe I'd just drop everything and…" A sickening certainty began to rise in my throat, but I ignored it. "Or even why you came to me in the first place. So why should I risk my life to help you?"

"**For five grand a week, like we agreed. Let's keep it professional. I could probably throw in a swooning, kidnapped woman who needs rescuing if that would help."** Bastard. Bastard, bastard, bastard.

"You're a god. I think you're worth a bit more then five grand a week." I replied. Shot in the dark, but it somehow seemed important. I couldn't back out, but I wanted to make him suffer, and this was the only thing I could think of.

"**So we're just haggling over the price. Coming from the man to proud to drive my car." **He snorts, and I have a sudden urge to reach over the table and bite his head off.

"Now hang on, that's way out of line."

"**You bait a god, bad things happen. Now lets get out of here. Long road to Washington."**

"I haven't agreed to anything yet." Not technically true. I should never have drunk the mead, my brain and liver agree.

"**Yes you have. But, since we're getting on so well, I suppose I can toss you the odd bone. Do it well enough to impress me, and I'll take that Death Curse hovering above your head off as well. Compliments of the establishment."**

I blinked. He changed the rules of the game in one sentence, and I didn't even see it coming. Suddenly, I couldn't see the bar. I couldn't see the table, the empty glass of mead with foam clinging to the edges, the little hill of salt crystals or the face of Wednesday. All I saw was a bloody old shell of a body, that could barely be called human anymore, distorted by hate and rage burning with an intensity beyond any sort of rational limits. He smiled at me on uneven lips and whispered 'die alone'.

I had studiously avoided thinking about that, sealing it in a disused portion of my brain and throwing away the key, pretending it wasn't there. The elephant in the dining room. It had happened a while ago. A man named Cassius had me at his mercy. Rather then gloat and monologue while twirling a moustache and tying me to the train-tracks, he had broken tradition and done all that was humanly possible to make me suffer, while keeping me lucid enough to answer his questions. It had been one of the closest calls of my life. But even when the tables were turned, righteously I might add, and he met a bad end, he'd done what historically made going after wizards a bad idea.

A death curse.

All that was left of his power, his rage and pain, his life force and more, as well as, presumably, his love and more positive emotions, although I doubt he had much in the way of them, and pointed them at me like a loaded gun, rewriting my destiny. I would die alone, all that I loved would leave me, all that I cared about would vanish, and I would die alone, broken and full of regrets. He might not have articulated the last part, but the intent is what sold it.

And Odin had just told me it didn't have to be that way. Which was cheating. Because rather then manipulating my base emotions, fear, greed, the other ones people are always going for, he did something far more cruel. He went straight for the heart, and gave me a taste. The first bitter taste of that terrible illusion... Hope. I couldn't say no, because that would be slamming a door on the chance, flimsy though it might be, that I would have a happy ending. If I did, that would be like consigning myself to dying alone, unloved and full of regrets.

He made it worth it. Even if he didn't deliver, he still made it worth it for, just a while, to be whole again. And he knew that's what I'd think. He was counting on this very reaction.

"You're a liar. Can't be done." I all but spat it. It didn't even seem to phase him.

"**Of course. And a good one. The best you will ever meet. But I wouldn't be much of a liar if I didn't tell the truth some of the time to make matters uncertain." **

"And you're using me. You know I don't have a choice. Hell, you probably arranged all this."

"**The game's crooked."** He replies, then grins, and for once there might have been a flesh of genuine humour in there. **"But it's the only one in town." **With that he gets up and leaves, and I know I've got to shut up and dance.

I stopped to leave Mac a generous tip, figuring I owe him for putting up with Wednesday, then hurried after him, catching up outside the pub as he turned to walk back to his car. I sighed, glared daggers at his back, and then followed him. I understood that something had occurred, we'd made some sort of binding deal, though what it was I had no idea. Some ritual, apparently, though what the drinking had to do with it was beyond me. I already missed Bob and his encyclopaedic knowledge.

Whatever it was, he seemed to have got what he wanted. I only hoped it wasn't at my expense, although experience had taught me that he probably had. So I hoped that he'd be stupid and let me cheat him. Somehow I suspected he wasn't going to. It's not fair when they act smarter then me.

Getting into the passenger's seat, I waited silently as he started the car.

"**We have a long trip. Rest up and keep it down."**

He pushed a bottle of dark beer into my hand. All that got through the tumult of my feelings, worries, premonitions and all the rest was that it tasted a lot better then mead.


	7. Chapter 7 Part 1

**Budapest**

Blade went to his hidden lockers in the back of the armory and brought out his heavy-duty armor. It was in pieces for easy storage, but fitted together snugly into a cohesive whole of overlapping layers. By the time he'd finished suiting up, he looked like a riot cop. Black-leathered Kevlar covered him from chin down, turning him into a glossy shadow. It was heavy, but flexible and non restrictive, leaving his movements open and free. It barely even slowed him down.

He worked the leather and Kevlar, his three feet of acid etched titanium alloy blade from which he drew his name floating naturally from position to position as he went through a series of Katas. His body programmed in the extra weight, the tiny limitations that his armor imposed, until he was so used to it he didn't notice anymore. Perspiration filmed him, and his breathing quickened. He used the exertion to hone the focus, refine it and strengthen it until he reached the point that athletes call the zone and Emerson termed The Oversoul. The point where all was the Moment, and thought became instinct. Where the waves of individuality subside to become One with the outside world and everything in it.

The void was the perfect state of martial arts. Death did not exist. Fear did not exist. Hate existed only as a fuel. He was centered, the best he could be. His commitment was unquestionable and total. He was ready.

With a final flurry of swings, he sheathed the sword across his back. He crossed the room and reached for his shuriken, each one folded up after a final check, and then slotted into his belt. One by one, they slid into the tiny leather loops. Matte-black and silver-finished MACH pistols clicked into his shoulder holsters, and spare clips into the red-lined inside of his coat, which was then thrown over his armor. Explosives, and a detonator were put into place inside a sports bag that was slung over his shoulder, alongside a short-nosed custom built assault rifle and a couple of clips.

A long length of cheesewire was wrapped around his belt, where it could be freed with a sharp tug. A coupe of long bladed- knives, darkened lamp black, slipped into the sheaths of his boots. Various cunning and intricate devices were taken from bags and dropped in his few remaining pockets. A slim container with an assortment of darts, their stems Braille coded for easy selection in the dark, was slung on his right hip, and a third pistol, this one with only a single chamber was placed on his left.

Satisfied, he turns and walks out of the room, clanking only slightly as he does so.

A slim, wiry silhouette looks up from the workbench where he is twisting metal into cruel, jagged shapes with a lathe, sparks flying everywhere, and pulls down his goggles. "You forgetting something?" He calls in a gruff, whiskey-aged voice, and tosses something at the back of Blade's head.

Blade stretches out an arm in the last instant, catches it without looking up, and puts the sunglasses over his eyes, then walked out the rest of the way.

The car was parked in the garage, exactly where he'd left it.

Dark gray and sleek, the 1969 Dodge Charger had been the definition of powerful and high performance before Whistler had gotten his hands on it. The old man had once worked on cars, and had applied every trick he'd ever learned on it; in many ways it was his masterpiece.

He dropped behind the steering wheel and keyed the ignition. The engine caught immediately, sending a shudder through the car as a throaty roar filled the garage.

He shoved the gearshift into first, left rubber on the concrete as he sped out, and turned onto the backstreets, driving down them at breakneck. He enjoyed driving the car, liked the way it handled. While he kept his life empty, devoid of attachment and emotion, it would be a shame to leave the car here, if it didn't get completely destroyed in the nights work. The Charger lunged forward like a great cat, straightening out as its power came to life. He pulled the wheel hard, and pressed the accelerator the rest of the way to the floor.

Death was a'coming.

Kraven watched the monitors on the consoles and screens in front of him, looking for a sign of the Daywalker. The entire room was wired for video and audio transmission. He was in a large dark room, but it seemed small with the clutter of sleek, high-tech equipment. No lights were on except for his screen, and the blinking of servers, and the computers surrounding him. From here he could watch every street in the city, listen to any conversation, locate anyone. From here he would co-ordinate the coven's best killers and strategize. From here he was all powerful. Yet despite the manpower and technology, he couldn't slake a feeling of uncertainty, as though he'd missed something.

Which was ridiculous, of course.

He'd had the idea a while ago, and had worked carefully and meticulously to bring it about. Victor was an old fool, a warlord who'd supported Teppes adrift in the modern age. And Marcus was worse. Both of them were keeping the Corvinus clan back with their bloody-mindedness, and old fashioned adherence to out-dated practices. Thanks to him leading the drive to modernize, they had become far more fearsome then they had ever been before hand, the clan had become one of the most powerful and influential in the Red Court.

But the modernization was spreading, and while Kraven was the tip of the wave swelling beneath the rigid structure that had existed since before the Roman Empire, he was also very aware of his own vulnerability, and weakness. He was seven hundred years old, and a high noble, but did not command his own bloodline. If he did, he could do even more.

Images of synthetic blood, thoroughly domesticated humans mass-consumed and kept in cages, and other, more exciting ideas flashed through his skull. He wouldn't even need the Red Kings support, if he was careful. But for now, that was just that, a dream. He would need more influence, power, and credibility to bring it about, and first he'd have to dispose of the damn gargoyles stooping over his shoulder and holding him back.

But he couldn't just kill Victor. The old man was so fearsome even Abhartach treated him with more respect then his own spawn, and was more then capable of dealing with any assassination attempt that Kraven put forward, then tracing it back to the source. So he needed a third party to do it for him. He'd put forward a few, stretching his fingers into other pies, but in the end he'd given up on each option. Then he had a break-through. Who better then the Day Walker, the greatest lone threat to the courts since Abraham Van Hellsing?

He had baited the vampire hunter, by carefully giving information to the Order of Saint Giles through Corvinus's patsy, Martin, who had passed it on to Blade. That had brought the Daywalker into the city, and now he just had to wait. If Blade won, then he would rise up and take control of the coven. If Victor did, he would take the credit for arranging the death of Blade, and from that become an elder on his own, from which he could deal with the other three at his leisure. Either way, no loosing outcome.

He had several schemes in play, all at once. Kraven had made a deal with Lucian, progenitor of a race of loup-garou, immortal hybrids, that he would take credit for his murder in exchange for helping Lucian to go into hiding until he was strong enough to kill Viktor. He was greatly praised and rewarded for killing Lucian and supposedly setting the great blaze that had burned Lucien's castle to the ground, and furthermore had used his understanding of the Modern world to invest a fortune, and make them all very influential.

Thanks to that, Kraven rose through the ranks of the Vampire elite, eventually being made steward of the entire Vampire Coven. But he wanted more. And to do that, he would need a change of regime. Waiting for an Elder to die of natural causes was an exercise in futility. The first step to taking a vacant seat was to make it vacant. And Lucien was no longer a reliable ally.

Now all he had to do was watch it come to pass, and see that nobody he liked too much got killed as a result. With that in mind, he looked up.

On screen, a team of leather clad, elite vampires, each a master of their bloody craft zipped through the concrete labyrinth, taking positions and preparing for battle.

Using the fingertip toggle, Kraven selected the street view, focusing on the back of Selene's head, admiring her smooth curves, as he had so many times. Though she purported to spurn his advances, for the moment at least, eternity made all things possible, if one was patient. She was so beautiful, he mused to himself. If only she was his.

And, she would be. Soon.

Selene perched upon the roof of a sooty building, gazing down at the city below. Driving rain pelted Budapest, while the howling wind carried the memory of winters long past. Given her nature, her senses were sharp. She could scent blood with the ease of a shark, her eyes were as sharp as a hunting falcons, and not so much as a whisper missed her notice as she gazed into the crowds below with predatory intent. She was a beautiful woman, with dark brown hair and alabaster. Lustrous black leather clung to her every curve, like they had been painted on, and she bore a confidence about her that showed that while she had little use for her appearance, she was capable and competent. The tail of her trenchcoat flapped in the wind.

Heedless of both the storm and her own precarious roost, she stared out into the night, perched on the narrow ledge, the gargoyles her only company. Her tongue traced the polished contours of her fangs, and her striking blue eyes fixed on the teeming streets beneath her.

She and her fellow death dealers were ready. Twin Berettas rested against her hips, as well as a few, more specialized devices. Those who survived in the Supernatural world quickly learned to diversify, never putting their faith in a single thing, and while the guns had served her well she had other things to fall back on.

Beneath her, four of her kind with SWAT styled battle gear took their positions, waiting for their chance to strike. They were the covens first line of defense against any enemy. And she was the best of them.

But even they felt a slim flicker of fear. They could not be sure who was the hunter, and who the prey.

Blade drove the dodge charger through the streets, following his prey back to their nests. The area was unfamiliar, but you'd never guess it. Even in the back streets and narrow turns he drove like they were six lane highways, each turn and corner handled perfectly and flawlessly. The Charger slipped and wove through traffic like a big, grey tiger.

He was expecting company. When company arrived, he didn't even flinch. He just smiled a joyless, hard smile and pushed the accelerator, the car speeding towards the dark-skinned vampire in the middle of the road.

Kahn, weapons master of the coven waited patiently as the car approached. He was dressed, like all the coven's warriors, in black leather and chainmail that, compiled with his black skin, made him seem like some extension of the darkness. His practiced hands held enormous M60 cocked and ready to fire a stream of armor piercing rounds, shredding the car to scrap metal and Blade with it.

Blade didn't waver in his course, even for a moment. There is no room for doubt in the hunter. No room for anything but his purpose. A gloved hand moved from the wheel, and casually flicks a switch, turning on the high beam headlights. Whistler loved working on cars, and had redesigned this one with vampires in mind. The cone of light bathed the vampire, and he screamed in agony as his flesh sizzled and blackened in the deadly rays, then burst into flames, igniting like a human torch. Smoke gushed from the creases of his armor, but there was no respite.

He got off less than a dozen shots before the car hit him like a battering ram, and left only a cloud of chalky white ash and a smear of blood in its wake. The bullets had barely grazed the paint. Of course, it was an utterly useless gesture. Ordinary bullets wouldn't kill him even if they punched through the car and then his Kevlar. And to all intents and purposes, he was driving what was essentially a high performance tank.

Blade sped on.

The second Death Dealer was far better prepared. Reinhardt was a knight of the house of Erebus, on loan to the house of Corvinus, and part of the order of _Dhampiraj_, better known as the Bloodpack; a group of warriors and assassins who were originally assembled to hunt down and kill threats to the Red Court. The Bloodpack, like everything the Red Court did, had obvious political roots, with each major clan required to send a single representative for the role, in a show of faith and a demonstration of unity and common purpose. In principle. In practice, faction loyalties remained firmly entrenched, and far from being a cohesive fighting force more time was spent squabbling over direction.

So the order was called a success because nobody wanted to admit it wasn't, and then ignored. Which was why only two members of nearly fifty where present. Reinhardt himself, and Selene.

Reinhardt had studied the daywalker, and knew the danger of a direct fight. So he changed the rules. At the end of the street was a barricade erected by the simple expedient of ramming five cars together to form an impassable roadblock. And as the street was too narrow to turn, the only remaining option was to retreat and look for an alternate route.

The vampire had no intention of giving him that long to act. Removing a grenade from his harness the second Blade came into range, he pulled the pin and tossed it, the grenade coming to rest beneath the car, and the resulting explosion flipping the car on its side with a scream of tortured metal, sparks flying up as the momentum sent it smashing it over the curb and into the unyielding brick of the apartment complex.

Grunting in a mildly satisfied, noncommittal fashion, Reinhardt reaches to his hips and removes his weapons of choice. A pair of modified full-automatic Glock 18C machine pistols, with axe blades on the undersides in a manner similar to bayonets.

Behind the barricade, Soren, another of the more conventional death dealers, watches and waits, completely silent.

Reinhardt opens the door, to find the car empty. "Shit." He says, frustration etched deep, but Soren points a finger to his lips, then looks up. Reinhardt slowly follows his gaze, dreading what he was bound to see.

Blade drops down from the roof like an avenging angel, sword descending at Reinhardt's face. The vampire throws up his guns, the attached blades catching the blow, but Blade is relentless. His knee smashes into the larger vampire's kidney, and his sword flashes again and again, severing tendons and ligaments in the space between heartbeats. In less time than it takes most people to take a deep breath, Blade has cut the bigger vampire to shreds, and turns to look at Soren.

Soren stares at him, cocks his head to the left, then coolly removes his jacket to reveal crisscrossed whips wrapped around him, looping at his shoulders and necks. Freeing them with a jerk of his hands, he begins swinging them, the whips writhing like snakes, weaving a pattern of death between them.

Anyone trying to approach would get flayed to the bone, the silver barbs and hooks only making things worse. And Soren was a master, not leaving so much as a single opening, no weakness to exploit. Speeding his moves, he advances on Blade, who has no opening to exploit, is critically outranged, and has no way to back away. It seems he's got no way to counter.

Except one. Staring coldly at the vampire. Blade drew his pistol and shot him in the head, then twice more in his vitals to make sure. Satisfied, he steps over the burning corpse that was glowing white with phosphorus, and looks up at the night sky, baring his teeth in a feral smile. Then he walks on.

He was getting closer to the goal. He'd take out the whole nest tonight, elder and all. Spinning his gun, he replaced it, and moved onwards, into the night.

Kraven winces, then smiles. Soren is his most loyal supporter, and follower. He also is the only one who knows he arranged for Blade to be here, and his death will throw suspicion off Kraven. Couldn't have gone better if he planned it.

Blade was doing very well. He really was everything his hype claimed him to be. He'd breached the perimeter defenses already, and would be at the mansion in half an hour. But he wouldn't make it. The death dealers would all converge on him halfway there, he'd be trapped in a firefight and probably die, unless…

"We've lost sight of him." Kraven says. "He's keeping to blindspots, making him difficult to track." A blatant lie, Kraven can see his face on three screens at this very moment. He paused, then deleted the footage with a twitch of his finger. Not anymore.

He liked the observatory, though it had cost him a lot of effort to get it installed. It was so useful. You could eye your prey from safety, and only strike when it suited you. So much more dignified then the old way of stalking them when they happened along the street you were in. Another example of how the coven should conduct itself, thought of by him.

"He seems to be heading towards the mansion. Try to cut him off." With that he sits back and relaxes. Nothing more to worry about.

The mansion was a big, stately building, in a Victorian style that gave the impression of some lords country residence. It had considerable, walled off grounds hidden from the public eye and a high, electrified fence. There were dogs, armed human guards, and plenty of security.

Blade was used to seedy bars, drug dens and basements, run down warehouses and other such locations where unnatural acts took place. Glorified brothels, drug dens and torture cells, some with pretensions on the inside, most just a sea of bodies tearing apart their victims. It got pretty repetitive after a while, you marched into the backrooms of bars and strip clubs that financed the ongoing orgy, killed everyone, burned the place down to be sure of not leaving any evidence, then left before anyone could catch up to you. Despite this radical change of scenery, he doesn't feel anything but the usual, a wary readiness. There wasn't really a difference between the two, whatever they thought. Just presentation.

He eyed it again, this time looking for weaknesses and openings. The guards would know what their masters were. Why would they bother to hide it? So familiars then. He hated familiars. The dogs wouldn't really understand the nature of their owners, but he'd kill them just the same, though that was worse then killing the guards. He liked dogs. He didn't like familiars.

That in mind, he made directly for the gate, creeping along the side of the wall to minimalize visibility. For all his bulk, he moved like the wind, silent and unnoticed, nothing but a deeper patch of shadow. When he came to the gate, he slipped his sword under the glass of the security guards little booth and into his throat, silencing him before he could challenge the Daywalker or choke out a scream. Blood splattered the window, as the man gurgled and convulsed. Blade withdrew it quickly, glad the alarm wasn't raised, then stared at the gate thoughtfully.

Leaping, he grabbed the little post that the guard had manned, then leapt again off the wall, clearing the gate and landing in the grounds. With that, he strolls towards the mansion, pretending to ignore the barking of Rottweiler's closing on him.

Two men appear, both holding the massive dogs on the end of chains. Which they release, going for their guns with the same movement. Blade leaps over the dogs, rolling and landing between the two of them.

The first of the guards has a second to turn before Blade hits him in the side of the neck, then again beneath the ribs. Both times there is a crunch of bone. Pushing past him, Blade kicks the gun out of the other's hand and catches him in a palm thrust uppercut, shattering his nose and driving the cartilage against his skull. He then twists, flinging the second of the downed henchmen hurtling into the air, who soars ten feet before smashing into the wall. He doesn't get up. Blade is not an elegant man. He was a martial artist less concerned with form than inflicting damage to people's load-bearing joints, subduing them efficiently, in the quickest and easiest ways possible.

Normal humans never even have a chance against him. As the dogs turn, Blade is ready. Seizing hold of one dog as it leaps for his throat, he holds it by the throat, and throws it against the fence. He reaches for his gun to finish the job, and then the other dog knocks him from his feet before he can fire; he sprawls on the ground while the dog's teeth go straight for his throat. Blade is in trouble. It's been well trained. A little thing like death won't stop it from grabbing hold and never letting go.

Thankfully, he's ready. Still holding his gun, he forces it between the dog's open jaws. Similar in principle to a dog worrying at a bone, it forces it's teeth closed, and leaves Blade safe. The dog, its initial thrust thwarted, clamps on the metal, it's teeth making purchase against the slide, and then Blade pulls the trigger, ending a spray of bullets out the back of it's head. Tossing it's body aside, he does the same to the other dog, then looks up at the mansion.

Now comes the hard bit.


	8. Chapter 7 Part 2

Blade replaced the MACH pistol's slide and reloaded it with a fresh clip, leaping over the corpses of the first patrol as he did, and pushing his back behind a wall for cover, memorizing the positions of the men spread out in front of him.

He hadn't known the code to deactivate the alarm system announcing his arrival in the mansion. So he'd gone in, guns a'blazing, surprising the hell out of the guards who thought they were the ones hunting him.

Now it was time to turn the tables. Turning in a single smooth motion, he filled his hands with the MACH and shotgun. He triggered the rounds automatically. The security team was a mix of humans and vampires, and the way they fell over or blew apart told him which was which.

Not a single shot hit him in return.

The fire fight took barely moments, then everything grew still. He walked over to the corpses, reloading both weapons as he did, then checked the vital signs of each. Always confirm every kill.

The rapid, agonized breathing told him that one wound had been only superficial. Turning, he looked down at a human male, his face blurred by the cracked face mask the guards all wore. Without a word, he holstered the pistol and took the shotgun two-handed, pressing the shotgun muzzle to the mask at the place that would be between his eyes. There was no mercy, and no pity in the heart of the Hunter. Everybody here was here by choice. There were no innocents.

"Please no." The man begged, his mouth full of blood and making him splutter. He had a gut wound. Not necessarily fatal. "I'm a human, I just work for them."

Blade squeezed the trigger, his expression changing not one iota. Much the same to him.

Kraven watched Blade make short work of the guards, and felt a flutter of doubt. He had a sudden premonition that the Daywalker would not prove so easy to deal with as he hoped. What if it did kill Victor? Then what would he do?

The doors sliding open behind him was the only warning Kraven had that someone was coming. He quickly leaned forward, pressing the button to begin lockdown. The guards ignored him, manhandling him to his feet with more roughness then was strictly necessary. He was not well liked in certain circles.

"Victor wants you." They said, then dragged him away over the top of his protestations, forcing him out the door.

Blade listened to the series of massive slams echoing around him. He strode through the corridors with a grim stride, spotting shutters on windows and doors sliding closed all around him, sealing him in. They were trying to lock him in the mansion. Blade thought that was fine, better even. It meant they couldn't get away from him either.

The mansion was a maze of rooms, corridors and walls. He had expected no less.

Two vampires carrying assault rifles leapt around a corner at the other end of the room, baying their challenge as they pumped off rounds. Blade racked the shotguns slide and aimed from the hip, blasting them both with silver stakes, and they fell both fell like flaming scarecrows. The bullets had mostly gone wide, but a few hit his body armor, and one cut through the fabric of his coat and grazed his shoulder. He didn't even notice the pain, such was his focus.

Racking the slide again, Blade heard a whisper of movement overhead. He looked up, bringing the shotgun with him, but couldn't get the barrel around in time to shoot the vampire dropping down from the ceiling.

He met the vampires fall with the shotgun barrel, slamming it into the vampire's face going for the upper jaw. Teeth shattered, and the vampire's head jerked violently to the side. Incredibly, the vampire rolled with the blow, took the damage, and rolled to a standing position as soon as he touched down. The vampire leapt again, his features contorted with pain and rage, his jaw grossly distended to reveal his one remaining fang.

Holding the shotgun with a fist, Blade filled that mouth with a silver stake that exploded the creatures head.

A door opened in front of Blade. He whipped the shotgun and fired instantly. The door partially protected the vampire taking cover behind it, but it didn't conceal him completely. The stake tore the vampire's face away in a flaming rush of destruction.

Running to the door, Blade jammed his foot into the doorsill before the lock could catch, wedging it firmly in place. Another vampire stood on the other side of the door, and fired a handful of rounds at the hunter. Blade felt three of them slam into his body armor, knocking him back. He kept his foot in place, and thrust the shotguns barrel into the room through the crack of the door.

The first shot took the vampire who had dived behind the couch in the chest, ripping a burning hole where his stillborn heart lay. The next blew an ornate Japanese vase, showering orchids all over the room. Then the shotgun's breech locked back empty.

Not having any more ammunition or time to reload, Blade slung the weapon and drew the MACH. Crossing the room at a run, he continued deeper into the nest, looking for signs of more.

A pair of vampires confronted him at the next hallway, lifting their weapons and giving him ten rounds rapid.

Blade dived behind the wall, feeling it shudder as it absorbed the impact of the bullets. When the autofire died down, he whirled around the corner and leveled the MACH, squeezing the trigger twice and snapping off two perfect shots, putting his bullets in the hearts of both vampires before they even have time to notice he's moved. They staggered back and went down as the custom rounds began their lethal attacks on the vampires systems.

The special bullets were made rather ad-hoc, tipped with; silver hollow-points, holding holy water and essence of garlic. He also had special UV rounds made based on a high tech military prototype tracer rounds, that burned them from the inside out, but they were still too much a work in progress to try here.

Hurrying down the hall to the left, he found only an empty den, filled with elegant and expensive furniture, and a few hollowed eyed pale humans in clingy clothing, who had recently been drained of blood. None of them even noted his existence, they just watched the ceiling with a blank-eyed stare. Blade let out a growl, then turned back, to find himself facing another vampire, with a sawn-off shotgun.

Blade threw himself to the ground as a burst of buckshot cut through the air above his head. The pellets blew fist sized holes in the wall behind him. Before the vampire could take another shot, blade brought up the MACH and put a hole directly between his eyes. The impact rocked the vampire back, but it was swirling ash before it hit the ground.

Blade doubled back, this time going right, to find himself in the inner sanctum. Hundreds of vampires lounged and sprawled on the furniture, dressed in stylish, clean black suits and gorgeous sexy cocktail dresses, enjoying their leisure. A few drank blood out of wine glasses or beckoned over dead eyed servants to tap straight into the vein. Others talked to each other or twirled together sinuously, stroking and touching each other.

Several towards the back were snorting lines of what he guessed to be cocaine mixed with blood, while another was having the flesh along his back removed, so that his spine could be seen.

Blade stood alone amidst the vampires, like a jagged rock thrusting up from a cruel and cold sea. His features showed nothing but iron discipline as he gazed at the assembled vampires.

"Is that him?" Someone asked.

"Jesus, that's him!"

"Blade!" A female vampire screamed, falling off the couch she had lain on to scramble away. "It's the daywalker."

Blade didn't reply. He let his guns do the talking for him. Blade whipped the longcoat back and off, his gloved hands drawing the pistols in from the shoulder holsters with fluid speed, and leveled them both at the undead, blasting out a drumbeat of death, exploding on contact with the vampires and incinerating them into a cloud of black ash.

Some tried to fight, leaping at him armed only with their claws and talons, but he moved faster, blasting them before they got close. Some tried to hide, but he tore through the cover, rooted them out and downed them the same way. Most tried to run, but he was blocking the entrance, and they had to get through him.

It was a massacre.

The regal elder stared at Kraven with an icy disdain. Piercing azure eyes peered from is gaunt, clean shaven face. Thin grey hair receded from his lofty brow. An aquiline nose distinguished his patrician countenance. A black velvet robe clothed his narrow frame. Thin and spare he might be, but not soft. He looked to be roughly fifty by normal standards, though like most of his kind in this mansion his true age was measured in centuries.

A trio of unsmiling death-dealers escorted the regent into the throne room to stand before the elder. His protestations and the fact that they were manhandling him hinted that there were many places he'd rather be.

"How did he get in?" Victor snapped, hand catching the younger vampires chin and forcing him to meet his eyes. His voice was clipped and with just a hint of a lisp. To him, Kraven's obvious anxiety seemed all the proof of guilt that was needed. "How did he even know where to look?"

Kraven swallowed hard, his cool deserting himself in the face of Victor's gimlet stare. He wrung his hands together anxiously. "I have no idea."

"I do." Victor stated. There was only one obvious conclusion. "You brought him here." He turned to the soldier to the right. His mind was made up. Someone had to pay for this night's catastrophe. "Kill him."

The vampire nodded, emotionlessly, and cocked his dessert eagle, planting it at the back of Kraven's head. At this range, it was as good as decapitation.

"No!" Kraven yelped, suddenly desperate. This is not how he'd pictured it. He had not expected Blade to kill almost all of the coven. He had not expected Victor to guess the truth. He had not expected to die. So he did the one thing left to him. He begged and pleaded.

Kraven dropped to his knees on the cold, hard flagstones, clasping his hands and shrilly protesting his innocence. "No milord! Why would I do such a thing? I am your most loyal servant. I would never do such a thing, I swear!"

Victor watched, impassive as stone, pondering his judgment. Could it be that he was being too hasty in his judgment? Perhaps there was a better way to use the reliable traitor… although such action could not be left unpunished. "So you say." He replies, sounding extremely unconvinced. "Convince me." The guard lowered the gun, so it was once more resting on the back of Kraven's head, and readied himself to pull the trigger. Victor raised his hand at the last moment, forestalling it.

"Yes. Oh yes, my lord. Thank you!" Kraven says, then meets Victor's gimlet eyes, vaguely reptilian and realizes he's far from vindicated.

"Get up." He replied, disdainfully, then addresses the four remaining Death-dealers, and incidentally all that is left of the House of Corvinus's inner circle. There are another three outside, no doubt closing in as fast as they could, but they would not return in time. "Begin preparations. We will be forced to abandon this house."

"But… my work. My –" Kraven began, unwisely forgetting that moments ago he had been in line for summary execution.

"Forget you're pitiful treasures! There is more to risk then them." Victor roared. "Have you considered that the elders are at risk?" He turns to the other vampires.

"Get them. At once." He turns, and stretches out a pale hand. A kneeling warrior pressed a sword into it, which he took and brandished with a worrying amount of familiarity. "This is a matter for warriors."

"A... At once my lord." Kraven stuttered, desperate to get away.

But Victor didn't even seem to hear him. He looked at the sword, admiring the edge and balance, factoring in the weight and length, then suddenly twisted, and grabbed Kraven by the throat. With no visible effort, he lifted him off the floor, and brought him close, until their faces were inches apart.

"Let's see what you're hiding, shall we?" He says, then sinks his fangs into the cleft of Kraven's neck.

The blood is cold and thick, like treacle, oozing slowly, and sticky. It brings a heady rush, unlike any other. Thicker, richer, and far more potent. It sang in his throat even as he sucked it down greedily. This was the distillate of life eternal. This was _power_.

When you drain another vampire, you take their power, in the manner you take the life of a mortal, and the manner you leach your own by siring Gets. Drink enough, and they became beholden to you, in the manner of your own children in darkness. Kraven was old, and while he was never as strong as Victor, the blood makes him feel vital, alive and powerful, as he restored the part of himself he had given away when he had first sired the childe.

With the rush of blood and power comes the memories. Scattered fragments, each no more then a frame frozen in eternity. Images and emotions, tangled and disjointed, fear and hate and ambition and all the rest. Victor ignores them, digging deeper, until he finds what he's looking for.

He finds the plot, Kraven's dream that had brought ruin to the entire coven. He is not pleased.

He draws away Kraven, very much reduced now that his strength has been torn from him, then drops him in the manner of a man discarding a soiled tissue. Kraven looks up, only to see the descending blade lash through him, slicing the head off Kraven's still kneeling form in a single, fluid blow so fine it took the vampire a few seconds to realize he was dead. Nodding in a satisfied manner, assured of the sharpness and quality of the sword and glad to have disposed of a traitor, Victor turned and walked back to his throne.

" I only regret I could kill him but once. Take what can be salvaged, and leave. I'll deal with Blade myself."

Gathering himself, Blade ran down the hall, loosing the final rounds to nail a vampire trying to escape. He holstered the pistol and stepped through the double doors, into another corridor, that led the throne room.

He faced the entrance, taking a moment to compose himself, then stepped through, drawing his sword.

Victor sat in place atop a raised dias in the center, another throne on either side, and a drawn sword resting on his knees. His naked blade was a long gleam of silver in the low light, and his posture was one of confidence, even eagerness.

"Found you, old man." Blade says, smiling his own wolfen smirk as he glories in the predator in his nature. He loved this. Without this, he would have nothing. Not even hate for a ruined life.

"You will wish you hadn't." Victor replied, his eyes flickering over to him, his electric blue ones meeting Blades grey. Neither had any yield in them. Victor stood up and advanced. With a single, practiced motion, Blade lowered the tip of his sword and did the same thing. They both stopped just out of range of each other, eyes still locked in a duel of wills.

Blade broke first, and lunged, swinging his blade in a brilliant arc that would have taken the elders head clean off in a single blow. Only Victor wasn't there when it arrived, he leaned back out of reach, the blade missing him by less then an inch, then counter-thrust, his larger, heavier sword matching Blade's. While it created more openings, it's superior range was a telling advantage.

Victor smiled, his blade darting out and whickering for Blade's head. A slower man would have died there, but Blade twisted aside, Victor scouring his forehead with the point of his sword. He smiled then, and pulled back, enjoying himself. "It's time someone put you in your place."

"Think you're the man to do it, mother fucker?" Blade replies, swatting aside a few strikes then coming in again. Blade clashed on blade as the two fought.

They were fire and ice opposed. Victor fought wildly but craftily, leaving no openings and taking advantage of every opportunity. He was a living flame, bending back, leaping in, feinting, thrusting, warding, striking – disdaining his opponent's every move.

Blade's skill was cold, calculating, scintillant. He made no waste of movement, no motion not absolutely necessary. He seemed to devote more time and effort to defense then his opponent, yet there was no hesitancy in his attack, and when he thrust, his blade shot out with the speed of a striking snake.

The two seemed well matched, Victor swifter, stronger and wilier by a scant, flashing margin, and more experienced by centuries besides, but Blade's skill reached a finer point of perfection. Victor's fencing was fiery, dynamic, like a blast from a furnace. Blade was more steady – less instinctive, more the thinking fighter, though he, too, was a natural born slayer, with the co-ordination and violent instinct only born killers possessed.

Minutes flew by; the clang and clash of steel did not diminish. Now they stood squarely in the center of the room, Victor untouched, Blade's clothes and skin red with the blood that oozed from cuts on cheek, breast, arm and thigh. As if the sight drove him to further fury and passion, the Elder attacked with feral power, the sight lending him even more strength. But if Blade felt the ebb of his powers, he did not show. His countenance did not change expression, losing his cold intensity, and he pressed the fight with the same cold fury as he had in the beginning.

But it wasn't enough. No matter how fast Blade pushed himself, Victor seemed to get faster. Blade started to take more chances, trying to slip past the sword and finish this quickly with a decisive strike. He didn't think about the swords movement anymore - he became the movement, became the blade itself. There was only the blade and the unforgiving net of steel he wove around himself.

Sparks jumped along the edges of both weapons, grating hisses of razored edges echoing around them, as the two threw themselves at each other with murderous intent, but Blade was losing his fight. Another cut, on his other cheek, then a lighting slash to his thigh. The wounds were not deep, but the flow of blood sapped at him, weakening his reserves.

Victor's defense was immaculate, a perfect rhythm to everything Blade had to offer. He had not lived so long and endured so much by being weak. And he had seen the death of enemies just as fearsome as Blade. He would not lose this.

Blade's lungs ached, burned from their need of oxygen. Salt from his perspiration stung his eyes. He was tiring, his body reaching its limits. Where the undead monster he was fighting could go on forever. For the first time he could remember, Blade began to doubt. Parrying an angled cross, he launched a furious counter-attack that slammed against the elders defenses like a hammer striking an anvil.

Then, in a flash, he saw his opening as Victor pulled his sword back. Blade stepped in, slashing at the vampires exposed arm, knocking the sword from the elder's fingers. Unarmed, Victor leapt back, missing the killing stroke by a fraction of an inch, and lowered himself into a crouch, fanged mouth open wide. He roared, his entire musculature driven by controlled fury.

Deep within himself, he heard a sound. It repeated itself, over and over, growing louder and longer each time. A howl. It was more then animalistic, burning with a feral unreasoning hatred, intense past any point of human comprehension. It's grip on his soul and body tightened until it was absolute. His face shifted, as the other side of his nature was unleashed.

He cloaked himself in an air of sophistication and culture, of lordly disdain, but beneath it he was of the blood of Abhartach Cathrain, The Crimson King, and it showed. There was grave-mould in his bloodline, a ravening madness that was suppressed but never really conquered. That's the sickness, the great curse of the Red Court.

The bones in his face cracked and elongated, his jaw distending to reveal lethal fangs, his vivid blue eyes glowing with an unholy knight, like the reflection on ice, and his body changing, twisting and hunching with primitive power.

He feinted to the left, snarling, and when Blade moved to counter he went right, throwing himself into a roll beneath Blade's sword, and turning, so that they faced each other again.

"Blade, Blade, Blade." Victor hefted the sword, switching it from right hand to left hand and back again. He moved up onto his toes, then rocked back on his heels. "You're a man of few words."

Blade stepped into his defense, grabbed his sword with his left hand, trapping it even as it sliced into the meat of his hand, and rammed his sword down the vampires throat and out the other side.

Victor choked on the blade. A bloody froth bubbled past his lips. Blade leaned into the thrust until their faces were only inches apart. Victor looked back in pain and shocked disbelief as a crimson haze flooded his bulging blue eyes.

He yanked back his sword, leaving Victor waiting silently, blood dripping down his chin as he tried to form words. Blade didn't much care what he wanted to say. Every vampire over a couple of decades had something to say at the end. It came with a long life. Already dead once, they seemed unable or unwilling to comprehend it could happen again.

He unclipped an incendiary grenade from his harness, and slipped the pin. "I hear you elders die hard. So I think I'll start with fire this time." Victor raised one shaking hand, as though trying to clutch at Blade's coat. Blade walked past him.

He didn't even look back as he felt the heat rush across his back like a thousand fleeing mice, almost hot enough to blister. He ignored the _whoooomph! _of exploding fuel mixture, and the crackling of flames.

That was the night's work dealt with. Time to take out the trash.

The inky waters of a subterranean river lapped against the slimy stone dock at the bottom of the steps. Reflecting torchlight casting rippling shadows onto the walls of the cavern. Luminous green algae clung to the damp limestone walls, and jagged stalactites hang above the nervous vampire's head like the fabled sword of Damocles. Roosting bats rustled in the shadows.

Her soft hands tugged on a rusty chain as she struggled with a complex bolt and tackle system hanging from the ceiling. At the other end of the chain, suspended above the murky waters below, was a polished brass sarcophagus, engraved with intricate cabalistic runes. An ornate letter A was embossed on the head of the heavy metal coffin.

Erika strained to hold the sarcophagus steady as she carefully lowered the casket into the ebony skiff waiting below. Despite her attempts at social climbing, she'd been a maid until tonight, and had no idea this place even existed. The boat, moored to a dimly lit pier, had been here since the mansion was built hundreds of years ago, awaiting just such an emergency. She could hear it bumping gently against the pier.

The chain slipped through her fingers, causing the hanging sarcophagus to drop precariously for a few feet before she got it back under control. Straining to support the coffin's ponderous weight, she slowed it down to a more prudent pace.

_Forgive me for disturbing you, Lady Amelia._ She thought. _Victor's orders._

Erika has been a vampire for twenty-seven years, and had always preferred the comforts of Ordoghaz over any kind of killing or fighting. Indeed, in all her life she'd never been in a fight. She'd always imagined it as something exiting and exhilarating. Not the bloody slaughter that she had been confronted with. She preferred the feeling of indulgent immortality to a confrontation of just how vulnerable she is.

Of course, it wasn't _really_ over.

The coven would rebuild. And she'd be an elder, or something like it, as she'd be one of the oldest surviving members. That more then made up for having Kraven die. She did feel a fondness for him, and in fact had believed herself to be in love with him for a while, but his distance had made her lose faith, and she'd turned her attentions elsewhere. Just as well, if she had been drawn in she'd be dead by now.

Slumbering in their tombs, oblivious to the tempestuous events that were raging above them, the hibernating elders were vulnerable to the Daywalker, defenseless but for a woman who'd never even held a gun before. No, she well understood why they had to be moved with utmost secrecy away. She just wished there was somebody else for Victor to assign the nerve-wracking responsibility to.

She let out a sigh of relief as Amelia's coffin came to rest within the skiff. She held the chain for a few more moments, just to make sure it didn't capsize, then scuttled down the stairs. Marcus's coffin, as well as Victor's empty coffin, were already aboard, stylized initials distinguishing them apart, as they slept waiting for their turn to awaken and rule. The Chain followed an endless rotary cycle in which the three Elders took turns in ruling over the Vampire Coven. That way, each would rule undisputed and not spend their time engaging in politicking, scheming and conspiracy against one another, a cycle unbroken for fourteen centuries.

A cycle she now had a good chance of joining. Elder might be out of the question, at least for a long time, but perhaps she could take her sires position, as steward of the entire Vampire Coven. Perhaps even better then him, if Victor liked blonds.

The skiff rocked unnervingly as she clambered aboard. The sluggish current of the hidden river coursed past the hull. A hanging lantern illuminated the pier as she scrambled to fit a pair of painted black oars into their locks. Her trembling fingers required three tries before she got the locks securely into place. Then she reached the prow, ready to cast off.

Only to find an ebony hand holding the other end of the chain. Blade had found her. He seemed even more fearsome, covered in blood and panting with exertion. If her heart still beat, it would have stopped. Blade gave her a pitiless smile, then kicked her off the skiff with his steel-toed army boot, breaking her jaw and sending her into the freezing ice-cold running water, to be swept away by the current. Then he looked at the two coffins, and his smile widened. With a flick, he pulled out his last pair of incendiary grenades, and dropped them in, then cut the boat loose.

He leaned against the rock, and watched the ship go down, burning steadily.

Then he turned and walked back up, already planning his retreat, and next mission. Martin swore by South America, and he'd have to be gone from Europe before they tracked him. Making his way up the steps, he paused a moment, wrapping his hand in a strip of fabric. Unlike his other cuts, that one was bad, all the way to the bone. It would take a week or so to heal. That would make his job harder.

Then he froze. He checked again, but he wasn't mistaken. In the throneroom, where there should have been ash and melted clothing, Victor was gone, leaving nothing but a smear of blood behind.


	9. Chapter 8

The vampire stepped out of the carpark, up towards the entrance to the bar. He was enough to give any woman a hormonal surge, and had a slight swagger, an unconscious poise that marked him as a predator. He was handsome in a sharp, well-built way, and wore a collared shirt and slacks, as close as he ever came to casual.

William Thomas Compton was born March 13, 1835, and died in 1865. But he didn't stay dead, and had crossed over as a Black Court childe. The Black Court were unable to bring many over, the success rate was so low that they'd never had numbers. And thanks to the White Court, only the exceptionally clever and exceptionally powerful still lived, scattered throughout the world.

Bill was neither. He was simply careful, fearful of his own nature, and good at passing for a human. He wore suits, and concentrated most of his powers on keeping his body young and handsome, as many gets did before they accepted their new lives and willingly passed on, becoming the living corpses that formed the Black Court's aristocracy. His preservation was not a simple matter of vanity, even the most superficial and self-absorbed vampire tended to allow their body to move on before the first year was up. It was due to the fact it would be so very easy to stop his constant efforts at preserving the shell he'd lived his mortal life in. But when he did, he really wouldn't be human anymore. He'd stop caring, and pass over completely. So he was little better than Red Court chattel, but he was as close to human as he could manage.

His life had been all but empty, the world of the living had become what a man who had suffered through Malaria might remember the darkest, deepest phase of the illness. Voices seemed to echo and overlap each other, and the simplest acts were hard to do, a struggle to make himself care enough. But people were worst. They had become shadows pulsing with red life that he longed to take and use to ease the terrible emptiness he felt inside. It was a struggle not to kill, to fight his nature. And after so long, it was all he could do to even remember why he did.

He was losing the battle to remain human. He knew it. And he didn't care anymore. Indeed, he'd come back here, to the town he'd been born and raised, to find if he still felt anything at all. His house was empty, a rundown shell on the outskirts, forgotten by all but the oldest, and he could see a family resemblance in everyone he saw. It was like a dream, where everything was strange, and yet familiar, viewed through a twilight world.

He could see elements of their ancestors in all of them, evidence of the town's original appearance in the street and buildings, and a hundred other cues that sent him tumbling back to the past.

So at last, he came here, Merlotte's Bar and Grill, hoping to take a last look at those he saw. Largely resigned to being disappointed by what he found, he thought it was still his only chance at closure, at finding some last link to hold him in the world, before he fell into the night forever.

"Not in my backyard. Piss off." A man says as he approached, in a bored drawl. He looks like anybody you see on the street, a tall man of no age with a broad, intelligent brow, receding dark hair and a certain rugged charm. Despite the humid heat of the swamp, the stranger wore a short, denim jacket belted at the waist, faded, pegged jeans, and old, dusty rundown cowboy boots.

He's well in the process of smirking a sardonic grin, mocking the world and hope and all the people in it, his arms folded across his broad chest. Occasionally he'd give a greeting to some passerby or another, who'd speed up without quite knowing why, certain in the back of their mind they'd seen him before, but not quite able to place him.

He had, in fact, come to Bon Temps, Louisiana often. At least twice a decade, though never for more then a few months. He'd been everywhere, he felt sometimes, and here was better then most. It was his country, and none knew or loved it better. He knew where the roads went and came from, and he treaded them at night in the sure knowledge that the night held nothing more terrible then him...and wasn't it fine?

He had never come as himself, of course. He came under a different name each time, always with a different face and a different bag of tricks. However, two things about him never changed. He always came hooded, a man who seemed almost to have no face, and he always left the same way, twenty or so minutes before whatever he'd done was picked up on and attracted the sort of interest he didn't care for, walking onward to his next place of interest.

He'd never worked great things here, because great things didn't happen in the middle of nowhere. But he liked things the way he worked just the same, none of that cheap mass produced murder, no, you got to savor all the little emotions, all of it. Lynching's, beatings, it was all so easy, harnessing the wave of ignorance, malcontent and petty viciousness into a weapon he could turn on whoever it pleased him to target, and watch as they tore them apart.

For Flagg was a sickness, a fever looking for a cool brow to heat up. He hooded his actions in mystery and deceit just as he hooded his face. And – as it always did after a span of years – trouble came, and he was discovered, Flagg always disappeared like shadows at dawn. Later, when the carnage was over and the fever had passed, when the rebuilding was complete and there was again something worth destroying, Flagg would appear once more, grinning that infernal grin.

He was always moving throughout America and who knows where else, a clot, a tiny spec of foreign matter, a splinter of bone looking for an organ to puncture, a lonely lunatic cell looking for a mate to raise a cozy malignant tumor, and the Nevernever and Network and the country roads he walked were the veins and capillaries he traveled along in the vast body that was humanity, ready to take him wherever he wished to go.

Even now he leans against a post and grins, whistling Johnny Cash's 'When The Man Comes Around'. It's a genuine grin alright, one that shines with a dark hilarity, that echoes the feeling in his heart. Most men wore their beliefs in a way all could see them, and so does Flagg, needing nothing more then that smile. It was the grin of a hatefully happy man, a grin that spoke of a love of being the only one not in pain, that radiated a horrible charismatic cruelty. It was a grin that was guaranteed to make animals slink away whining and arguments over inconsequential things turn bloody. A mad smile. 'Oh, but we're all mad here,' as the Cheshire Cat had told Alice. He darkles. He tincts. And spins evil across the lands.

Vampires are predators, and have senses beyond their prey, that let them feel the world around them. They are drawn to crypts and graveyards because death comforted them, revitalizing them and giving them rest where there was only emptiness, they could sense each other and feel the presence of prey. And they could sense things that were hidden to others. He saw more then he wished to see, enough to see that there was a lot more to Flagg then that shape he wore. He knew what Flagg was, even if he didn't have words for it. The Archetype of the Shadow. The dark in every man, he was. He spoke to the worst in all people, and they loved to hear it, to listen to him, because he sounded just like temptation.

Whatever his antecedents, his past, he was something wholly other than their sum, and there was no way divide him back into his origins, find his beginning, for he would not go. Whoever would seek out his history would find only tenuous links, unconnected events, cryptic mentions and be bourn through the lack of anything definitive to at last find no sign at all of his commencing. Beyond time, beyond events, he has stepped from a void without terminus or origin. He was more then that.

Bill got all this in a flash, and it sent him reeling, staggering back on his heels and almost falling on his rear. The man didn't move, but suddenly seemed to loom above him, and his smile widened. "Oh good, you're paying attention. Hate to repeat myself, you know?" He uncrosses his arms and lets them hang for a moment, then curls one around the wooden pole that held up the roof he's been leaning on.

"Go on then. Back your shit down, and get outa town. Or I'll eat you all up." Then he threw back his head, and bellowed laughter up at the stars for all the world to hear. He might be laughing, but he wasn't joking.

Bill took a step back, and held up his hands. "You want me to leave? Why? What for?"

"To be honest? I don't care what you do. I just want you out of town, you Black Court whipping boy, so take care of it." He lets go of the post and begins walking forward, Bill finding himself caught petrified in that gaze, held in place like a rabbit caught in the headlights. He tries to fight it, but he has no purchase, nothing to fight back with. His will wasn't merely pushed aside, it was swept away as though it had never been. "Or you'll live a long time, but not in good health."

Bill had lived a long time by any standard. Even the most ancient of demons saw the better part of two hundred years as a respectable amount of time. Anyone could use another two hundred years. And he was wise enough to understand that, if he wanted to keep on living, he'd leave.

Bill left as silently as he'd come, unseen and unremarked.

The dark man smiled again, gave him a cheery wave that he wasn't around to see, and turned on his heel. Interlocking his fingers and resting them on his flat belly, he walked around the driveway and up to the front door.

A dog in the parking lot yelped and backed away. He stared over at it, meeting it's eyes for just a moment, and the yelps changed to a whine as it cringed, turned and bolted, yelping at everyone it could see. A few gave it confused looks, but most paid it little attention. But if it could have spoken, the dog would have told them that the black scent approaching them from behind did not belong to a man; it was a monster chasing them, something horrible beyond horrible.

Sam, who sometimes was the dog, could have told them everything the dog wanted to say, but Sam was inside, and wasn't able to hear it's complaints.

The men in the bar, however, were not so prescient or aware as the dog, and only gave him a quick gaze before returning to their drinks and greasy meals, their thoughts and their lives had them caught up that they couldn't sense the darkness that passed within inches of them.

He steps up to the table and sits down, crossing his legs beneath it and looking about, waiting until he saw the face he was looking for.

She was a southern belle, sun-kissed, golden haired and blue eyed, with a face that was pretty and open rather then beautiful, until she smiled at least, and a slim build with generous hips and an impressive bust. Her smile was infectious, although a little flat. She was smiling for tips, not for pleasure. He smiles right back, eyes settling on her.

Sookie makes her way to his table, then starts. As she's stepped through the bar, she's heard the inane babble, the susurrus of voices and sounds as people thought. She had managed to drown it out mostly, although she still heard snatches, most of it unwelcome.

He was different. As she looks down at his tale, she starts, almost dropping her tray, as she hears nothing where she should be sensing the whirl of thoughts that were his mind. Not silence, emptiness, complete and total. She felt as though she were groping her way through a familiar room, in the dark, reaching mindlessly out only to meet only empty air as her stomach drops away. For a moment, there is a primal instinct to flee, to run away as hard as she can, then it goes, and she finds herself staring into his eyes. And what eyes they were.

His eyes shone with more amusement, and he stuck out his thumbs. They were both double jointed, and they wiggled back and forth in angles that seemed to defy biology and physics.

He leans back.

"What can I do for you?" She asks, although it's not the question she wants to ask. 'Who are you? What are you?' would be much better.

"Now that would be asking." He says, his smile widening, like something the color of sun on the grass that crouches, making only the noise it wants to be heard, only stirring when something young and tender wobbles by. And she was caught in his gaze, too young, innocent and foolish to realize that if she didn't run, and run now, she'd be bones picked clean by the time the sun rose.

And Flagg winked. "There isn't a hotel in town, is there?" He asks, then whispers conspiratorially "I wanna do bad things to you."


	10. Chapter 9

She sweltered in the afternoon. It was over a hundred degrees, easy, and the air was drier than it had any right to be, even in the middle of the desert. There was a good reason most people waited until night to go out in Vegas. And it wasn't just the lights that shone down the Strip as you drove down that famous street of casinos.

She passed the Monte Carlo and the MGM. She looked longingly at a bar called the Devils Nest before passing that as well, and she continued on past a pyramid, a pirate ship, the Eifel tower and what looked like the Statue of Liberty's little sister. It all looked sad, now that the sun was up, and you could actually see them. Sort of tacky, the glamour faded under the light of the day.

She didn't know what she was looking for, exactly. Maybe a place to get out of the heat for a bit, maybe a nice guy who just won big and needed a pretty girl to spend it on, maybe find a party and have some fun, maybe get drunk, maybe anything. She'd come here thinking it was the perfect place for her. She was wrong. Everything was superficial, nobody knew anyone and all contact was completely meaningless and empty. Same as the excitement once the newness of it all wore off.

She needed a bit of that, if she was going to run her own game. She didn't want people smothering you all the time, but sometimes, it was nice to have something else as well. When the chips were down, or you just needed to talk about nothing, she needed something to rely on. She sighed, and stuck a thumb out. She couldn't remember the way back to the hotel, so she'd have to take a lift. She'd have one more night on the Town, hopefully meet someone interesting, then go… somewhere else. She felt good about East. East seemed the way to go from here.

Alone. That one word seemed to sum up every event in her entire, too short life. Everything she had done, she had done it alone. Everything she had been through, she'd been through it alone. Since the day she was born she was destined for loneliness.

And what's worse, she couldn't even blame someone else. She'd had chances and managed to ruin them all. She always trusted the wrong people, always made the wrong choices and driven her friends away. And now here she was. The second Slayer. The fifth wheel. No, not even that anymore, with all the slayers popping up everywhere she was part of the chosen many, the army of thousands. There were more Slayers appearing every day, far more then had been expected, and apparently the new Watchers Council was at wits end trying to draw them all together, for training or whatever.

Good luck with that. Forgive her if she misses the party. She's spent her whole career in Buffy's shadow; if Buffy still wants a sidekick then good for her, she can get her backup from elsewhere. One of the rest of her army, they'd probably be queuing for consideration. But Faith has places to be, and she means to go and find out where they are.

Wesley's job offer had come next, and that had been even easier. Wolfram and Hart. Nobody at school had ever said anything about her being a lawyer one day, that sort of thing didn't happen to white trash in the deep South, but somehow she doubted it was place she'd be comfortable. And anyway, the offer was for politeness sake, and she knew it. If they needed muscle they could buy it by the metric tonne, and the rest of the job, well maybe sucked was too strong a word, but damned if she could think of another one to describe her proficiency or interest in any part of what she did beyond the fighting.

It wasn't that she wanted to stay alone, it's just that it was easier to be on the edge. Friends were only good if you had plenty of space as well, or you end up defining yourself by the people you are dependent on. No, somewhere in America there was a sunny little hellhole that needed a champion, and maybe if she kept out of the light, she'd pass for one.

She waved her outstretched hand a few times, and waited for a lift. She never had to wait long. The first car drove straight past – the driver gave her a look of longing but his girlfriend was in the car beside him, and he didn't want the trouble picking up a pretty girl would cause. The next one stopped.

"I'm going to the Western Nellis Motel." She says, giving him a smile she almost felt. "Near the strip."

"Not too far out of my way. Get in." He says back. Faith liked him already – he wasn't staring too brazenly, he was in good shape, polite and the car was well cared for. In his mid-thirties, but the age difference didn't bother her. She even toyed for a few moments with the idea of giving him her number, before she remembered she'd have left Las Vegas by tomorrow and she doesn't have a phone anyway.

She was still a wanted criminal, though Wesley had offered to get her off the hook completely. She doesn't have a phone for obvious reasons. She then considered just tossing subtle aside and going home with him, but he clearly had somewhere to be and she wasn't really in the mood for sex this early. She liked sex, but it wasn't a dependency, and it was never any good when she felt like this anyway.

It's amazing how easy it is to get away with being a wanted criminal if you don't act like one, and didn't mind doing without a few things she'd never really had anyway. After Sunnydale was reclaimed by the earth she'd asked Angel for a favour. Wesley had sent her a new identity, passport, license, even birth certificate and enough money to live comfortably for a couple of years. As long as nobody inspected them too closely or checked her fingerprints she should be alright. That was when the job offer had arrived, but she hadn't even considered it. She liked Wes, and she wanted the best for him, but there was nothing for her there. She was done working for people. She hadn't even visited, figuring if she did there'd never be a clean break. She wanted to build her own life somewhere else, and to do that she'd have to start on her own.

If she went over there, she'd just become a member of team Angel. They were good people, but she'd rather be team Faith.

Of course, she had to decide where team Faith was going to operate first. No luck on that regard yet, though maybe Las Vegas wasn't the best place to start. For one thing, everything cost three times as much as anywhere else, for another once you got over the gambling and drinking and easy access to sin, there was nothing to do that you couldn't do better anywhere else.

"So." The driver says, by way of conversation, "Who're you here with?"

She blinked, realizing she'd been practically daydreaming, then remembered she didn't care. Then, she decided to answer anyway, for want of something better to do. "Solo act at the moment. Haven't seen my friends in a while" Faith replies, not really listening, her mouth running on automatic. She's looking out the windshield vaguely, wondering where she's going next. There was nothing at the hotel to do besides Cable, the pool was being drained and she didn't know anyone else. This would have to be a quick stop, until she thought of something. Which hopefully would not be going out and wandering the streets again.

"Trying to get lucky then?"

"I don't know yet. I guess something like that."

He tries to make conversation a few more times, and continues to draw blank. At last he gives up and drops her off at the motel, next to the car park. She thanks him, and gives him a smile, then walks up the stairs, past the empty pool and along the little balcony around the rooms.

It's probably the priciest place she's ever stayed. Isn't that sad?

She passes her room, then makes her way into the front office and sighs in satisfaction at the controlled coolness brought about by the air conditioner. Bliss.

She goes to the desk and gets her key, then back out along the staircase, back to her room. She's not tired yet, so she'll watch T.V until she is, maybe have a shower and just watch the time pass by. Maybe she should get a hobby or something, this isn't anyway to live, watching the seconds tick past and waiting for opportunity to catch up with her.

She misses Slaying. It gave her a purpose in life, a direction, a reason for being. And yet, since the battle, she's ignored her calling, too busy looking for a place to belong.

Then she stops, finding herself suddenly brought out of her shell and hyper aware of the world around her. There wasn't anything to see, the pool was empty but for a few stray leaves on the bottom and a yellowish stain around the rim, the doors were locked and the blinds down, and she was alone. But she feels something wrong, some tingling down her spine. A premonition.

If there is one thing being a slayer has taught her to respect, it's her instincts, her intuition. Something is nearby, and probably means her harm. They always do.

She opens her door, the key getting stuck in the lock as she tried to turn it the wrong way, then sliding open. She locks her door when she leaves her room, but doesn't bother much more with security, figuring she didn't have anything to steal that you couldn't get anywhere else with less effort. Still, she doubted who or whatever it was had any plans on going after Faith. Nobody knew she was here, and she hadn't actually killed and demons since… she didn't even know. And so, if the door was still locked, nothing could have gotten into her room.

False alarm then. She feels a little disappointed, she could do with something to take her mind off self pity, and there was no better cure then violence and plenty of it. Stepping over her threshold, she yawns, stretches like a cat, switching the lights on automatically, then suddenly focuses. There is somebody waiting for her in her room afterall.

He's a bit above average height, maybe six feet. Taller than her, anyway. He has blond hair like spun gold, that frames his face in curls that she's slightly jealous of, and he has piercing blue eyes. At least, they look blue to her, anyone more interested would probably wax eloquent to describe them but she really can't be bothered. His face is pretty good as well, if you liked that sort of thing. His mouth is too big and his nose to narrow to call him conventionally handsome, but you could do worse. It's extremely animated, constantly changing expression or drinking in some new detail.

He seemed very happy to see her. That was nothing new, guys were always happy to see her in her experience, which was considerable. But she's a Slayer, and those aren't the details she's interested in. They're not even the details she notices first. He's pale. In the fluorescent lighting he's almost white as bleached bone. He's cold. And he's dressed in the sort of expensive new age romantic getup that only one sort of being would wear, and a desperate one at that. And even though they are three stories up, he came in through the window.

"Vampire." She sinks into a fighters crouch, hands clenching into fists and raising to protect her face. Motel, on reflection, was a bad idea. No real threshold. She should have gone with a bed and breakfast or something. Even that guy's place, whateverhisname.

The vampire spreads his arms, leaving himself open and drawing attention to the fact that he's unarmed, his face alight and welcoming, though given it's her room that seems a little wrong. He didn't do emotions by halves., that was for sure. "I mean you no harm." He says. "I just want to talk."

"Nothing to worry about there, it isn't going to be me getting hurt." Faith quips back, wishing she had a stake. A strange thing, how easy it was to improvise a stake and kill a vampire. It was like the universe worked against them, the way they would meet their end in unlikely ways. A table leg, a bed post, a bit of broken door, anything. On that tangent, she stress around. No such luck, cast iron furniture. She'd have to improvise.

He clicks his tongue, shaking his head. "Such barbarity. How little you know about us. You see us hunting in the night and think you've learned all there is to know. You don't know our culture, our custom, our civilization." He says. "You do not understand the Courts, the good we do, the world we dwell in, not so far apart from your own. While some of us are animals, many of us are artists and poets of the finest calibre. We are lovers and music makers, singers of songs and dreamers of dreams."

Faith rolled her eyes. "I'm sorry, you got me mixed up with B. She gets off on the whole lack of pulse thing and shacks up with the dead, I just stake you once and call it a night." she replies, walking towards him. There is a cross and holy water on the table beside her bed, and while she doesn't have any stakes whittled in preparation (she's here as Faith Lehane, party girl. Not Faith Lehane, vampire slayer) she figures with those things she can probably kill him, unless he's much tougher then he looks. And that seems unlikely, if the get-up was anything to go by. Second-raters dressed like that. The real dangerous vampires kept up to date with current styles, or simply dressed however they wanted and bugger the rest of the world.

"And so eagerly do you kill us. A valkyrie, a warrior woman like no other, a veritable goddess of destruction. And yet, killing is all you do. I'd almost call it a curse, your burden."" His voice is slightly rough, and deeper then before. He's aroused. What's more, he thinks he's being subtle about it.

Then again, Faith wasn't a subtle girl.

"So eager to kill us, yet you do not even know why I came here, or who I am. You have not asked my reasons for seeking out you, or asked if any crimes burden my conscience. You did not even ask my name. To you, my mere existence is sufficient reason to inspire murder. And yet, you claim I am the one at fault."

Good point that. How did he get here? Sun is up and with a vengeance. "I know it's pretty god damn weird to suck people's blood." She replies, for want of anything better to say. "Besides, I go through your type so quick a name would only confuse us both and you'd get clingy, catch my drift?" She's almost in reach of the table now…

He ignores her. "It is necessary for us to kill to survive. We have a single purity of purpose, a singular drive. We are the kindest of tyrants, you yourself consume the living in order to sustain yourselves. But life is a fragile thing, a savage garden where the strong feed on the weak, all for the greater-"

"Look, eating people isn't a lifestyle choice. You're a vampire, so I kill you. That's the way it works. Deal with it." She says, already frustrated with him. For god sakes, would it kill him to shut up? Or perhaps she just had to kill him to shut him up.

That in mind she grabs the Holy water and tosses it at him in an under-arm toss, grabbing the cross in her other hand and holding it up to ward him away.

He blurred, and caught the jar broke harmlessly, which then shattered in his hands, the class cutting into the meat. Unfortunately, that was the extent of the damage, which healed almost instantly. He didn't hiss or recoil in pain, start smoking or otherwise react violently to it. The water simply ran down him, soaking into his prissy clothes and then onto the floor, pooling around his feet. He was completely untouched. He takes a moment to straighten his jacket, then looks at her again. "Is my presence really so distasteful to you?" He says, walking towards her, hands in pockets. "So utterly unpalatable that you already resort to murder?"

Man, he really couldn't get a hint. Faith twists, throwing a kick in his midsection, then twisting to drive her elbow into the side of his neck. Vampires are hard to kill, yes, but their body still functions. They still have nerves, pressure points, and arteries. Their organs might not do anything, but a kidney punch still caused them blinding pain. And while they can heal most wounds, if you do enough damage they'll go down. "Just because you use long words, you aren't necessarily smart. Just saying."

He steps smartly to the left, avoiding her outstretched foot, then catches her forearm, his body as immovable as steel. "Lets not fight simply because it is easier then conversation." He says, unhanding her, the sudden change of balance causing her to stagger back a step.

That was unexpected. She looks up at him, suddenly more focused on the fight. Looks like he knew a thing or two after all. He had the advantage, and he'd done nothing with it. She didn't trust that. Not in the least.

"I simply have questions I would be very much grateful if you could take the time to answer. I am inquiring about -" He steps back, dodging a roundhouse punch, then a kick between his delicates, catches her fist almost negligently, then a head-butt catches him in the nose, breaking it with a spray of blood and a crunch of cartilage. Fighting fair was only playing to type. She fought to win.

The broken nose didn't even phase him. He just straightened it, then looked down at his waistcoat distastefully. The blood had ruined the silk, despite the wound having already healed the clothes were done. Faith felt a sudden wave of satisfaction at having destroyed his ridiculous attire, and get the sort of reaction she wanted out of him.

"I assure you, madam, there is no need for this. My intentions are strictly honourable. I simply wish you to tell me what you did…"

She kicked him again, sending him staggering back to hit the wall, cracking the plaster. Without giving him a chance to recover, she kicked him, again and again and again, her army boots crashing into him, each blow sending him through the render and plasterboard, crunching it and filling the air with white dust. The wall broke before he did, sending him crashing out of the room and to fall three stories to the ground, in direct sunlight. Except he didn't fall.

He was hovering, flying under his own power. His feet were planted on nothing at all, and yet he stood, in defiance of gravity, still facing her. Now that was impressive.

He was in the sunlight, but he wasn't burning. Smoking, but the actual ignition seemed to be passing him by. "Well, if you will not cooperate I suppose I have no choice but to threaten you. I will ask you one last time to either talk to me, or…"

A gunshot echoed through the air. Faith tensed, expecting a familiar feeling, but apparently it wasn't aimed at her. The Vampire shudders, a red hole appearing in his left shoulder as the bullet punches into his back and out the other side, exiting messily. He starts to turn, only for more bullets to thump into him like hammer blows, sending him reeling. Apparently, flight takes concentration, because he drops, crashing to the ground and bouncing once, a sickly crack making it plain that his body did indeed feel the fall.

Two men were standing by the roadside, beside an old- fashioned Chevrolet Impala, still in good knick despite being as old as the hills. They are young, good-looking, both about her age. One was tall and well built, his hair short, his face narrow and well formed. The other was thinner, his hair messy. They were alike enough to be unable to be anything but brothers, and they had a hard look about them, one she was well versed in. Anyone who lived the sort of life she was stuck with looked like that.

Faith doesn't spare her comrades more then a glance. She's focussed, concentrating on the fight. She leaps after him, hurtling out the window, then pushes off the wall at the last moment, altering the direction of her momentum and hitting the ground running, cross still in her hands.

He might have two bullets in him and a broken leg, but this vampire had some mongrel in him. He raises his head, like a predator who has just sensed the arrival of something bigger and more dangerous then he is. Then he gets to his feet swinging, but she blocks his fist with her forearm then breaks his nose with her forehead again, knocking him over and driving the cross into his chest as a kind of impromptu stake in the same movement. The cross doesn't go in easy, but she puts her weight behind it and it slides into his flesh.

Lestat de Lioncourt gapes a moment, shocked at this sudden and unexpected ending, then falls to his knees. Blood slides out in a trickle, not the ocean one would expect, whatever kept him moving was more magical then physical. His shoulders slump, then he sags forward. And then, suddenly, the clothes are collapsing, crumpling in on themselves, drifting down onto the side of the road, empty but for that thin trickle.

She looks at the clothes a moment. The cravat is still knotted. The silk shirt is still beneath the waist coat and jacket, and still tucked into the pants. There is teeth, and hair, and nothing else. Death had dissolved him.

Faith steps over the clothes. That usually happened, it would past unnoticed. Indeed, she'd be surprised if they were still here in a few minutes. She kicks the jacket, as if to make sure it really was empty, then turns to look at the two men who'd fired at the vampire.

"I take it one of you can fill in the blanks." She says, tilting her head a little for a better look. She likes what she sees. "Because personally? No idea what the hell is going on."


End file.
